


grayscale

by spacedoutsweets



Series: BEANS... IN... SPACE! [1]
Category: Among Us (Video Game)
Genre: Alien Biology, Changing Impostors, Developing Relationship, Existing Relationship, F/M, Fluff, Gray and Obsidian are OCs with variations from original colors, Gray being a variation of White and Obsidian being a variation of Black, Groundhogs Day, Hence the White and Black tag, Impostors are not the bad guys, Interspecies Relationship(s), Memory Loss, Multiple Impostors, Multiple Lives, Multiple Realities, Murder, Outer Space, Repeating Lives, Repeating Worlds, Slow Burn, Tragedy, Villainous Corporations, interpretation of what impostors look like is not like the game, stuck in a loop
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-12-31
Updated: 2021-01-10
Packaged: 2021-03-11 01:27:02
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 6
Words: 24,226
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28446879
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/spacedoutsweets/pseuds/spacedoutsweets
Summary: Gray.Obsidian.Two individuals become aware of evolving circumstances as the world plays out over, and over, and over again...
Relationships: Crewmate/Impostor (Among Us), Cyan/Mint, Gray/Obsidian, White/Black - Relationship
Series: BEANS... IN... SPACE! [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2029846
Comments: 15
Kudos: 17





	1. failure failure failure failure failure

**Author's Note:**

> featuring obsidian and gray from my other among us story  
> these two have a complicated history with one another
> 
> a lot of death happens in this story under the premise of repeating worlds/lives/realities  
> i think i'll try to write encounters between these two in chronological order but if that ever changes then i'll add a note to the beginning of the chapter !!!

White sits at the table in front of her, leaning back and invisible beyond the dark visor. His gaze is unseen, but she feels his ichor: profuse, irate, disgusted, _vitriol_ , and every bit reflecting the feeling she feels toward _him_ and more.

“I trusted you,” Gray wants to spit, but she knows better than to muck up the inside of her visor.

“Me? You trusted _me?_ Some nerve you have, _Impostor!”_ The man stands and slams his hands on the table, white spacesuit straining from the tension.

On the side, the only buffer between White and Gray is a _tall_ man in a spacesuit as deep and dark as the void. Obsidian, named aptly so because _Black_ is— _was_ —already taken as a title by another crewmate at the space station, embodies the voice of reason. He is quiet and firm, occasionally grunting as the two nauts squabble and call each other out. There’s no indication what he thinks; Gray knows the swing vote could go either way.

“You know there’s _no_ way for Blue’s killer to be anyone but her, right?” White interjects, waving a hand at Obsidian when the latter doesn’t respond. _“She_ was the last one seen with them! _And_ she vouched for Orange and he was the Impostor!”

Gray’s gaze narrows behind her helmet. She wants to rip out her hair in frustration but only clenches her fists instead. White’s guilt seeps through—He’s trying to pin Blue’s murder on _her_ , and Blue vouched for her the night before his body was discovered! It’s clearly a way to redirect the flow of conversation and focus on _her_ , as if she’s the _only_ suspect, as if White isn’t seeping of guilt left and right! And it isn’t like Obsidian can be the killer; he’s been with her the past week, all the way up until Blue died! When the O2 was sabotaged, he fixed _both_ things while she was locked in storage.

White’s presence was unaccounted for, and it’s not _her_. Obsidian is clear. White **_is_** the killer. She doesn’t know how to make her point clearer. When White continues to blab on and on about _her_ absence in the face of imminent suffocating, when the man doesn’t let up pointing out every discrepancy in her voice—how dare he insinuate she’s guilty because she fumbles in her speech—when White goes _on_ , and _on_ , and _on_ for two minutes ranting and raving over all the times she was late to meetings or struggled on her tasks, the conversation reaches a boiling point.

 _“Shut up!”_ Gray snarls and slams her fists on the table. She is up on her feet in a second; her spacesuit’s boots thud when their weight hits the floor. White falls quiet; Obsidian turns to face Gray. Gray keeps her gaze locked on White’s form as she snaps, “Go ahead and vote! Do it! Get it over with! I’m sick of your shit—”

She grabs a datapad from a pouch attached to her waist and punches in a vote into the automated system. Nearby, Obsidian does the same. White is the last to vote but his body posture reeks of confidence; he is the loudest and first to shout when the votes come through: Gray receives one, Obsidian zero, and White _two_.

“What the fuck is wrong with you?” White snaps at Obsidian, falling off his seat in his attempts to scramble backward and away. He doesn’t get more than a few steps before the space station’s defense system processes the vote and powers on. Obsidian cocks his head to one side while White continues to curse and flip off the space station’s unfolding plasma turrets and the two nauts alike.

Gray half-expects to see the man transform into the monster he is. She moves away from the emergency meeting table and grips her fists at her sides. Obsidian joins her while a luscious voice bellows, _“Mira H.Q. Defense System online… Target identified. Executing judiciary protocol zeta. Please proceed to the ejection site crew member W-H-I-T-E-zero-one or you will be terminated.”_

“What’s wrong with you? She’s a monster! Using you—Obsidian! _Obsidian!”_ In a second, White is not standing by with guns trained on his environmental suit. He lunges forward at the two crew members; Gray yells in warning, but before she can get react further the Mira H.Q. Defense System _thunders_ loudly. Something charges and energy crackles before a bolt of light—blue, beautiful, _deadly_ —rockets forward and arcs around White’s body.

Gray catches herself mid-step, partially obscuring Obsidian from the body. She gasps and holds a hand up to shield herself from the light. When the searing rays fade and the pain ceases there are _chunks_ riddled across the ground. Patches of the white spacesuit and crimson viscera mingle with yellow fats and hunks of red muscle. Pools of plasma linger and the scent of burning flesh filters through her suit’s ventilation system. She switches to recycled air, but the odor doesn’t leave, only becomes stagnant, and Gray coughs and retches air in her suit. She gives up and unlocks her visor, willing it to slide down and take in the gruesome sight of her own accord.

“He should have cooperated.” Obsidian’s voice is close yet it feels far away. He stands at her side, looking at the remains avidly. “Ejections don’t kill crewmates. He had a chance in space.”

“He’s an Impostor—He should be dead, right?” Gray doesn’t look over. Her eyes shut and she turns from the gruesome scene. “Impostors should stay dead. They board our stations and slaughter us.”

“According to Mira,” Obsidian interjects, a sharp note to the man’s otherwise calm tone.

Gray shudders. “Mira doesn’t… Hasn’t lied.”

She takes her datapad and enters in the date, jotting down details of the votes and the subsequent termination of the naut. _Impostor,_ she corrects herself.

“It happened too quickly for me to say earlier, but,” the woman pauses, uncertain words on her tongue. She pushes the fluttering feelings aside and straightens upright. When she looks over, Gray notes Obsidian hasn’t moved or taken off his helmet. He remains tall, firm, and fearless, every bit the leader she—and others, once—expects him to be. Gray’s lips twitch at the edges before she averts her gaze and goes on. “—Thank you for believing me. I know—It didn’t look good, but…”

“You have nothing to apologize for, Gray.” Obsidian’s words don’t reassure her or the guilt on her shoulders.

The rest of the crew is still dead.

She shakes her head. Her long hair, having grown since she first shaved it off in preparation for joining Mira H.Q. months ago, dances and curls against her chin and nape freely. She crosses to the window of the cafeteria, unsure where else to go or what to do. Absentmindedly, her hand messes with a stray strand of hair.

“What happens now?” She breathes out, distracted by the weight of _everything_ around her. Behind the naut, an automated sanitation program activates and deploys dozens of tiny drones to clean the viscera left by White’s body.

“That depends on… you.” Obsidian joins her by the cafeteria window. The space station floats lazily, drowning in a sea of stars and hundreds of twinkling lights and dust particles.

Gray cocks a brow. She turns to face him, only to find he’s stepped forward, closing the distance between the two. The same, aggravating flutter of feelings in her stomach returns. Gray feels heat simmer in her face when she sees Obsidian undoing the clasps keeping his helmet sealed to his suit. Her eyes widen. “You—You’re the captain, not me.”

“Third in command—No, second in command now.” The man corrects her. He twists oxygen hoses off the side of his helmet. A hiss escapes the suit.

Gray forces her eyes away. There is no reason to dwell on bodily reactions to… _certain_ individuals. “I mean—”

“What do you think we should do, Gray?” Her fearless leader asks as he takes his helmet off and holds it at his side, tucking the object securely under one arm.

Obsidian’s gaze bores into her side. Gray doesn’t dare look. The _thump thump thump_ of her heart rises in volume until it is an erratic but constant reminder she’s alive. “We—Need to tell—The headquarters. The—Mira. We need to tell Mira. Mira H.Q. They need to be informed we had a breach in security—Two Impostors slaughtered most of the crew—They’ll send a more specialized team to the site. Nauts who know what they’re doing and how to clean up—”

“…Is that the best course of action?” _Now_ he has her full attention.

Gray ignores the heat in her face and glances at him. Her gaze scours his face: a naut’s, nothing out of the ordinary, with deep black skin and eyes shining like something from the stars. His sharp jawline is accented by supple lips and a hint of stubble around his chin. When she meets his eyes, she sees a fading twinkle and imagines a supernova: an explosion about to go off, a force beyond measure. She pauses, taken aback, when Obsidian lifts his hands and sets them on her shoulders.

“You saw the defense system. What it’s capable of. If anyone enters a crew member’s identification code—”

“I know what it does,” Gray begins to argue, but Obsidian gently squeezes one shoulder and she stops.

“What do you think Mira will do if they hear about this?” The man asks softly, carefully, almost as if he’s afraid of the answer.

“Wh—I told you,” Gray shoves his hands off and stares him down. “They’ll send a team in to help clean up! That’s what we’re taught in training—There’s protocols—”

“You believe they follow these protocols?”

“Why wouldn’t they?” Gray takes a step back, baffled by the captain’s words. “Why would Mira H.Q. lie to us? We’re nauts—”

“They’ve _always_ lied,” Obsidian states, voice rising in volume as he drops his hands to his sides. His eyes gleam with a mix of emotions she doesn’t expect to see in him. “Gray—Listen to me—Mira H.Q. is not what you think they are. They’re using you—Using us—Running experiments on alternate reality—"

Gray’s hands ball into fists. Her eyes are wide. “What the hell are you saying? Captain— _Obsidian!”_

She sees it then: the unnatural twitch of a form not quite solid, long maws and teeth and _tongue_ shuddering beneath the surface of faux flesh and fake suit. Gray’s nerves run cold. She takes another step back, words choking in her throat, as the realization sucks her in and chews her up with rancid, gnashing teeth. Gray’s heart pounds a million miles a second. She doesn’t register anything her strong, brave captain tells her before adrenaline kicks in, disbelief swarms, and her brain devolves to its most basic instinct: _flight._

She runs, a cry for help on her lips as she scampers past Obsidian—or _tries_ to, but the Impostor’s form shakes and suddenly he isn’t a _naut_. He’s something else, long and slithery and full of tendrils, a shapeshifter in the worst way, and he snaps an elongated limb and strikes her ankles. Gray screams as she’s ripped back against the window, her body smashing into the glass while disconcerting limbs wrap around her like a python constricting prey.

“Gray—Listen to me—” Obsidian begins again, his words curt as if he’s told her to return to her tasks.

Her eyes are wide and fearful. “Let me go—Obsidian! _Obsidian!_ ”

“I can’t do that,” he’s remorseful but not enough.

The grip on Gray’s body tightens until her arms are pinned to her sides. Obsidian—no, not Obsidian, an _Impostor_ —oozes forward and repeats himself in disembodied tones. “You _need_ to listen to me—Nothing’s what you think it is, Gray—Think about the situation—”

 _“You made me vote out a naut!”_ The realization hurts as much as the last, disbelief replaced by anger as she struggles and thrashes against the Impostor’s limbs. He’s ungodly strong, as powerful as the monsters spoken between recruits at Mira’s formal naut academy.

Gray’s eyes fill with tears. She bares her teeth, **_“Monster!”_**

“Gray—” Obsidian’s form is a sluggish mess of space, a flurry of stars and mesh of celestial mass forced into flesh, and if it wasn’t terrifying and wicked Gray might dare think it as _beautiful_.

But not now. Never now. Her anger blazes in her chest. By the time her struggles cease—out of exhaustion, not willpower—Gray is a panting, wretched mess seething with vitriol and possessing raw hate. Her glare is cold and deadly as she meets one of Obsidian’s dozens of twinkling eyes. “You won’t get away with it. Mira will find you eventually. They’ll notice the station’s quiet. They—”

“Gray,” Obsidian shakes, though his grip on her remains. “All I want is to explain—”

“Shut up! Murderer!” Gray thrashes again. _“I’ll kill you_ myself—! I swear it! You _fuck_ —I hate you! I'll kill you!"

Her words are cut off in a shaky breath when the Impostor’s body splits and, amidst the abyssal form before her, something pulls her in and wraps her up _tight_ in its grasp. Gray opens her mouth to scream but no sound comes out. Cold _—freezing_ —arms wrap around her in an embrace she doesn’t expect. The woman freezes as Obsidian’s incorporeal body soothes her in sounds of an alien language: deep, incomprehensible, infinite but demanding. Her body weakens. Her struggles cease. Sleep clouds the edges of her vision as her mind is lulled into a calm.

“Wh…y…?” the noise comes this time, a choked whisper.

 _“You won’t remember if I tell you,”_ the Impostor whispers, the voice familiar and gnawing from a time she doesn't know. Something like a hand but _not_ brushes hair off her forehead. _“I’m sorry.”_

He’s asphyxiating her in himself. Memories she doesn’t recall float to the surface and breach the wake of her consciousness. Then, like her fragile flesh, it too begins to suffocate and die.

Gray’s eyes shut. “Ob…”

 _“By every star in the sky,”_ the voice tells her, sweet and sad and smooth. _“I promise I'll find a way out_ _—"_

* * *

Obsidian's form grips the dead naut as the world crumples around him.

He failed, again. 

* * *

The alarms buzz violently inside the woman’s quarters. Her eyes shoot open and cold sweat sticks to her forehead. Grimacing, Gray rises in nothing more than a thin thermal bodysuit. Her gaze narrows as she looks at her hands: naut-like, slim, ready to continue with the medial labor the bastard company forces nauts through. It is but another reason to hate the corporation, but she keeps th thought to herself; any sign of disrespect can alert the authorities at Mira H.Q. and the last thing she needs is another swarm of nauts hunting her down. It’s been too short a time since she broke off from her kin and the mess the group left on the trading vessel is still under investigation.

 _You can handle this._ The woman clambers to the mirror and eyes it, lip twitching until her teeth are barred. She despises what she sees in the mirror: Mira H.Q.’s _finest_ , another sack of flesh sacrificed to shareholder greed and corporate domination. Without hesitating, the Impostor rears back and slams a fist through the shining panes.

Her blood drips a luminescent green. Her severed tendons, flesh, and muscle knits together in a flash of swirling white stars, eventually forming a glove-covered hand identical to any naut. She flexes it, satisfied, and turns to track down her gray-hued space suit.

Ten minutes later, the Impostor emerges from her quarters. Her fellow crew members stride past her in the direction of the mess hall. Gray hesitates, counting the bodies and faces until it clicks: no White.

 _There’s never been a White here,_ she corrects herself, brows furrowing behind her helmet. _Only a Black called…_

“Don’t idle, Gray.” The captain’s voice makes her tense. Gray’s eyes swivel up and she finds herself staring at the suited figure of a man she knows _far_ too well.

“Forgive me, Captain.” The woman huffs and crosses her arms. “I’m not an early riser.”

“You’ll get used to it,” Obsidian retorts, unamused, but he dawdles a moment—long enough for Gray to raise a brow.

“What?”

“Are you—Sleeping well?”

“Never better,” Gray answers. “And yourself?”

The moment’s hesitation makes Gray’s mind shudder. She doesn’t know why, but she fixates on him: tall, firm, unyielding. Obsidian is the collected, rational leader of the nauts onboard. A _valuable_ target to take out if she gets the chance.

But now isn’t the time. Too many nauts saw the two trailing behind the group. She can’t risk it.

“Don’t worry about me. You have too many things to concern yourself with as my… third-in-command,” Obsidian hums a moment, folding his arms behind his back. He clears his throat, “…Enjoy your breakfast.”

Then he is gone, striding away with silent steps. Gray’s chest races with the sound of fake hearts beating wildly against her ribcage, just shy of her central maw split across her chest. Her Impostor tongue slinks through hidden teeth along her torso and she grits the jaw in her head and the one in her chest with equal measure.

She’s going to hunt them down: him and the others. Every naut deserves to die for what Mira did to her species.

_Every. Single. One._


	2. still beautiful

His fist connects with the mirror. A sharp of glass embeds in the man’s hand, his beautiful black skin overwhelmed by a gush of crimson. His eyes widen as the blood drips from the laceration and pools in the sink. The captain growls and clutches his bleeding hand to his chest while digging through a cabinet for a first aid kit. Pulling the glass out takes longer than he likes; the man turns it over in the air and glares daggers before tossing it into an automated waste disposal bin in the corner of the bathroom.

As he cleans the injury and wraps it in gauze and fresh bandages, his mind is a race of everything that’s gone wrong.

Obsidian is not supposed to be a crewmate.

He’s lived through a lot of these _things_ : worlds, lives, realities, terminology be damned. He’s lived, and he’s died, and he lives again now as a fleshy red-blooded naut absent of a central maw or serrated teeth. His body is physical and full of organs, not a hint of stardust or twinkling cosmos within his eyes, his lips, his _everything_. It’s wrong. He’s wrong. Something has changed since he first became aware of _these_ things happening.

He’s supposed to be the Impostor.

His chest aches and body shudders as different thoughts pass his head. Obsidian ignores them in favor of finishing his morning routine: brush teeth, shave, and comb the little fuzz of a growing afro atop his head. He has not cut it in lifetimes, but lately his spawns have him emerge with a clean, bald head. To have a semblance of hair is another change, another… _problem._ Too many changes point to unpredictability and he _needs to know what the fuck is going on._

He thought he knew. He thought he understood. He was getting so close to succeeding at making Gray remember. He was _so close._ He finally lived a life where the two of them survived until the end despite being opposing forces in a universe built to punish them. He couldn’t convince her, tell her, _explain_ , before Gray’s stubbornness reared its head and she recoiled from the truth, but he had felt more confident about one day achieving his goal and helping her remember. _So close,_ the thought had screamed in his head. _But not close enough._

He knew if he didn’t kill her the world wouldn’t reset. He knew if she lived then she would act in the name of the very entities who damned them to repeating circumstances. He knew he _fucked up_ his chances when she swore to kill him.

She would have gladly done so. He knows this. He knows _her_. Obsidian pinches his nose and sighs heavily as he contemplates the present, willing thoughts of his companion to fade away like a falling star.

“I’m sorry.” He tells her, no one, himself, before cursing his treacherous brain for dragging him back to the thought of _her._

“I’m trying.” Obsidian mumbles under his breath as he strips himself of a thin thermal suit and fetches a clean one from an automated closet. It feels different to wear today: more constricting, present, a _nuisance_ between what he’s come to expect as Impostor.

“There has to be a way.” He tells himself, forces each word down his throat, as the man enters a code to unlock the massive container holding his spacesuit. It releases with a _hissssss_ and Obsidian leers daggers at the machine.

 _“Captain, your crew suit has been cleaned per your request.”_ The robotic voice of the artificial Mira H.Q. assistant plays, lifeless and monotone.

He resists cursing them again. Obsidian steps into the container and, piece-by-piece, equips the environmental protection suit issued for each naut. He detests every second of it, far too used to having a suit be an extension of _himself_ when Impostor.

 _I am a naut here. Not an Impostor._ The man reminds himself as he plucks the last piece, his helmet, and fixes it in place. He activates the seal and hears clasps automatically lock his helmet to his suit. Obsidian shudders at the claustrophobic nature of the suit.

When he steps outside his quarters, he finds the world looms on a space station during artificial daylight hours. The lights of the station blare brightly. It hurts his eyes. He feels his body tense as other crewmates greet him before moving on. _Gold, Cyan, Mint, Scarlet, Magenta… No. Where is she? Where’s Gray?_

He doesn’t consider the possibility of her being a crewmate because he _knows_ its impossible. Mira H.Q. has locked him and her and every other sucker in here to _suffer_ , an act of retribution for what they’ve done, and he can’t fathom the assholes giving Gray and Obsidian a moment’s solace by placing the two on the same side. No. He _expects_ them to make her Impostor, because if he’s a naut then she _must_ be pitted against him.

His suspicions are confirmed when he sees her emerge from her quarters. Her figure is hidden behind her suit, the ashen gray materials fitting her name perfectly. There is undeniable tension in her body, like she expects someone to look at her, to say something, to…

“Don’t idle, Gray.” Obsidian almost blurts out her real name, a name he knows she has never given anyone else of her own free will; no one but him. 

The woman— _Impostor_ —shifts slightly, helmet angling as if her gaze sweeps his form. Any other circumstances it might be nice, wanted even, but Obsidian knows she doesn’t look at him that way anymore. He knows the bloodlust brews inside all Impostors: a hatred for all Mira H.Q. employees, and rightfully so.

“Forgive me, Captain. I’m not an early riser.” Gray’s words are curt and cold and discouraging. She crosses her arms.

“…You’ll get used to it,” the man interjects, a part of him desperate to cling to all and any words she offers him. He cradles his composure and clings to the knowledge she will kill him if he acts now. But for a moment, he considers a world where she does believe him, agrees to listen, to talk, to _remember_ , and it leaves him in mourning long enough for Gray to notice.

 _“What?”_ She grunts.

Obsidian pauses. He has a role to play. The man scrambles for anything to say. “—Are—You—Sleeping well?”

_Do you dream of the lives you lose here?_

“Never better. And yourself?”

Obsidian’s breath hitches. He sees the bloodlust in Gray: coiling and uncoiling, writhing like a growing concoction about to react and explode. She wants him dead. She’s thinking about killing him _now_.

“Don’t worry about me,” he tells her, quickly redirecting the conversation to something that won’t provoke an early death this round. “You have too many things to worry about as my…”

_Everything._

Third-in-command. She’s his third-in-command here. The memories come to him as if they are real, _natural_ , and not the boundaries of the world enforced by invisible spectators laughing at his expense.

“Third-in-command.” Obsidian hums and folds his arms behind his back. It’s convincing; Gray’s figure eases in tension. Obsidian clears his throat. “Enjoy your breakfast.”

He wants nothing more than to take her in his arms and apologize for everything, swear by every life he lives he will find a way out of _this_ , but he restrains his wants and quickly strides past her. Gray doesn’t stop him.

He doesn’t eat breakfast.

* * *

There’s two other Impostors onboard: the buffoon called _Gold_ , and the reasonable but passive Magenta. Three Impostors should be able to _tear_ through a space station, even if it’s above the average capacity for what she expects, until rotten luck lands Gray in the middle of a one-on-eleven.

First—Gold gets caught venting. Ejected without hesitation. She despises voting for other Impostors, but multiple witnesses and camera footage can’t be argued against. To Gold’s credit, he sucker-punches the captain and almost snaps another naut’s neck before the station’s automated defense system blasts him into a thousand pieces amid a great green spray of blood.

Second—Magenta ought to be another naut with how useless the Impostor is. The only kill Magenta gets before being caught happens to _conveniently_ frame _her._ Gray spends ten minutes arguing her innocence. She winds up being voted, except the votes tie with Magenta thanks to the station captain skipping, and the crewmates devolve into angry debates and paranoid conspiracies while Magenta shoots her a look of relief.

It doesn’t matter, because Magenta gets caught the next day when two crewmates find the Impostor struggling with a dying naut. Gray votes the other Impostor out. She notes the captain, Obsidian, does the same.

The fact he remains alive eats at her. She cannot get the bastard out of her head. The loyal, firm follower of Mira H.Q. plagues her thoughts. She needs to take him out, remove him from the picture; he’s the moral compass. Rip out his spine and everything becomes a shitshow with no trust and zero communication.

She begins by calibrating the station’s electrical grid to respond to her commands. The Impostor stays up an entire night memorizing the task routines for the next week, and she picks a day where her duties intersect with the captain’s in an isolated corner of the station. He is required to make a biweekly maintenance check on the station’s central generator. With two vents connecting to the room and access to the automatic door locks and override, she wakes up an hour prior to the morning alarms and sneaks out of her quarters.

Straight to the generator—She doesn’t stop for anyone. Gray’s body shakes with bloodlust as she unlocks the generator room, slips inside, and punches in her identification code into an adjacent keypad. She authorizes the locks to reengage; the door groans softly before it seals and locks. The generator _thrums_ softly; the dim lights offer _just_ enough to navigate while she surveys the room.

The generator takes up most of the chamber. A walkway circles the machinery, with a ladder leading to a central platform where crewmates can access the control panel and override system. Coils of gleaming metal pump air in and out of the room. Specialized units line the far wall; tubes connect the machines to the generator’s core, flooding freezing liquid across different planes in the machine and cooling them to functioning levels. Smart, but nowhere near advanced enough for an Impostor to struggle with. Gray spends too much time nicking certain areas and loosening coils until the control panel’s overhanging monitor flashes a warning.

It takes longer than she expects. The woman is tired and weary when she her suit’s visor flashes a warning on the side. She’s been alerted to the morning alarms triggering in the crew quarters. Knowing Obsidian skips breakfast to handle maintenance checks first, she climbs up the generator and leaps unto the rafters spanning the ceiling. She hangs off them and waits for her prey.

He arrives after two minutes.

The captain’s tall, dark suit enters the room after the door begrudgingly slides open. Gray watches him walk forward and ascend to the central platform, climbing to where the control panel and it’s connected monitor wait. He pauses at the flashing screen.

 _“Gray!”_ Obsidian yells for _her_.

_How…?_

She narrows her gaze; questions be damned. The Impostor drops from the rafters and lands with a soft _thud._ Obsidian spins on his heels to face her but Gray has the door locked and power cut from the override system before Obsidian finishes climbing down.

 _“Gray,_ listen to me—" The man shouts at her, leaping off the ladder and holding up his hands. “You don’t need to do this. We don’t need to—"

 _“Captain_.” Gray hisses at her target. _“Shut up.”_

“No,” he snaps, but fear is evident in his voice.

It dances like a lure in the air, drawing Gray closer and filling her with renewed vigor and bloodlust.

 _“I’ve been dreaming of this for weeks,”_ the Impostor grits her teeth, her upper jaw and central maw alike clenching. Part of her figure begins to shift and unfurl; she twitches and shakes as her body transforms into a force radiating white light. _“Taking out one of Mira’s best… My kin will envy me.”_

Obsidian hisses and holds a hand up over his visor; the Captain steps back but doesn’t beg or plead before the cosmic aberration. Instead he shouts out, “I _know_ about Mira, Gray!”

 _“You know nothing,”_ she hisses and lurches forward.

Obsidian grunts and ducks out of her first pounce, backtracking around the generator while she howls in otherworldly tones and _hunts_. She leaps and crashes against the generator walls while she clambers after the man. A limb, aglow with warmth, shoots out an ensnares Obsidian’s ankle. He yells as she rips him back, tripping him and smashing his helmet and chest into the metal walkway. Obsidian kicks at her body and a corner of her abyssal tendril clips with the tubes of cooling fluid. The sudden shift in temperature _hurts;_ the star-born entity howls in pain and her grip loosens enough for Obsidian to stagger out of her grasp. He bolts for the door.

She hears him frantically entering numbers into the keypad. To Gray’s _immediate_ satisfaction, the door doesn’t budge; the override system remains offline and the locks in place.

 _“Surprised?”_ Gray whispers as she pulls herself together and reassembles her form into a crewmate visage. Her body saunters forward, her central maw visible in the bulging seam across her stomach and abdomen. Her Impostor tongue licks each visible tooth. Her mouth, visible in the absence of her helmet strewn across the walkway when she first transformed, does the same with her superficial _naut_ tongue.

“Gray, listen to me,” Obsidian turns around and backs against the door. “You don’t need to do this—I’m on your side—Killing me won’t help you! It won’t stop Mira!”

 _“I don’t skip opportunities, captain,”_ The Impostor retorts, mind racing a mile a minute. She cracks her neck. _“Though I… appreciate the skip. When we were voting on… Magenta and I.”_

Obsidian’s body tenses. His hands ball into fists as Gray walks up to him.

 _“Did you know back then? Like you knew today,”_ the Impostor demands of him. When Obsidian doesn’t answer, part of Gray’s body—her lower torso and legs—transforms into the blaring white cosmic force and rips him down to eye level. She’s intrigued but not surprised by her muscle memory: her hands glide to the clasps of the captain’s helmet. She unbuckles the connectors, rips out the hoses, and plucks his helmet off like she’s done it a million times before.

In a way, she has. The other crewmates died. He’ll join them soon.

 _“Answer me.”_ She snaps, gleaming eyes scouring the naut’s face and dark, dark skin. _“Obsidian—”_

“I did,” the captain confesses, meeting her line of sight. His gaze doesn’t waver. “I always did.”

 _“How?”_ Her grip tightens, a tendril snaking around his throat and pressing against the man’s airway.

Obsidian’s breath hitches.

Gray feels his heart race increase. The fear mixes with something else, something _more_ , and the combination intoxicates her. She lives for the emotions he produces; her form feeds off it, building into an imminent frenzy. But as Gray contemplates forgoing interrogation and ripping his throat out piece-by-piece, she feels a hand reach for her. Obsidian’s gloved fingers brush against her cheek. The woman freezes in place as Obsidian’s finger runs across her bottom lip.

“Still beautiful,” the captain whispers. “Still—”

He makes a soft noise, somewhere between an exhale and a choke, when her tendril impales one lung. She retracts it and punctures the other to ensure his fate. The man collapses against her, shaking, while Gray lowers him to the ground. Obsidian wheezes and gasps, his eyes flicking to her face and never leaving. His lips mouth out three words before he goes still in her arms. Gray’s bloodlust simmers down, not quite satisfied, but tamed by the confusion overtaking her.

The door powers back online.

 _“Why?”_ Gray asks the body. No answer. Her figure returns to that of Gray, third-in-command at the space station, a naut with a stubborn streak and attitude that drives others away. She’s taken out the captain, Obsidian, with no witnesses and ample time to get away. She should be happy. She should be relieved.

She knows something is wrong by the wetness pricking her eyes. Her eyes glaze over as she pulls him to her and shudders. _“Why? Why would you forgive me? You're part of Mira! You're... You're..."_

She’s too caught up in the grief, unexpected but seizing her like a tree torn from the ground in a hurricane. There is no stopping it when it comes: hot, wet streaks falling down her face, marking the Impostor with emotions she can’t process.

She doesn’t realize the door unlocks until too late. In a second, the station’s second-in-command, Cyan, and two engineers behind him open the doors and spot her. Gray stiffens and stares at them.

* * *

After a quick vote, the space station's crew ejects the dead captain and Impostor out of the airlock together. The world fades to black and a new round begins.


	3. hunger in my blood

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TW for this chapter: suicide at the end but not graphic/explicit details.  
> background music:  
> fractures by illenium
> 
> rewrote the last half, think it flows much better. ^_^

The mirror is broken. Obsidian stares at it, voice dry and words escaping him as thoughts swirl around his head. A minute passes where he doesn’t remember to breathe. The terror strangles his spirit, but his willpower is too strong to give up now. He did not become _this_ willingly, and he will not take a knee to the invisible spectators who yearn to break him and force his obedience.

 _Over my dead bodies._ The man grits his teeth. He examines his hand. In another life, it was lacerated by his own doing. Here, the flesh is knit together seamlessly. No scar.

He doesn’t need to stab himself to know his body does not shift or fold like a cosmological horror. He doesn't incorporate clothing as extensions of himself. His body is absent of stars. He is not the Impostor.

He doesn’t like change.

* * *

Gray sits at the far table in the cafeteria. Her eyes watch the stars twinkling outside the station window. Though a plate of food sits in front of her, none of it appeals to her Impostor palette. She yearns for the rich, deep emotions ravaging crewmates. There are many kinds of emotions, but each are delicious and carry a flavor unique to their own.

 _Fear_ is intoxicating. _Lust_ is spicy. _Sorrow_ is bittersweet, but _melancholy_ is sweet with a tang she enjoys. Happiness is _okay_ , but it retains a simple flavor, not quite bland but only mildly sweet. Not her type.

 _Worry_ is underwhelming at best; she dislikes the way it bleeds into the flavors of _fear_ , but she appreciates how the tart emotion mixes well with _melancholy. Apprehension_ is earthy. _Aggravation_ is like _fire,_ only increasing in heat the more angry one becomes. _Ire,_ unlike _fury,_ has a burnt undertone. It fuels her desire for ambushes over blatant displays of force; she detests ire fouling other flavors.

Then _longing_ is… an interesting emotion. The flavors are more complex, enthused with a note of sweetened spice but nowhere near the intensity of _lust_. 

It doesn’t surprise her hint of sweetness mixes with spice somewhere in the cafeteria. The space station is in the middle of _nowhere_. Plenty of crewmates have loved ones they miss. Off the top of her head, Gray recounts three crewmates who’ve mentioned family in the past: Scarlet, who comes from a massive family with five siblings and endless nephews and nieces. Mint, who sends pay home every month to her ailing parents; if she wasn’t an agent for Mira H.Q. then Gray might feel sympathy for her. Then there is Gold, who is very much an _idiot_ but speaks often of a cousin at another space station who is taking care of his dog.

None of the three are present. After Orange’s recent murder, the crewmates of the space station have split into pairs and trios for safety. Gray knows her behavior is too off-putting for anyone else to trust her. She gives the nauts onboard credit; their gut instinct to stay far away from her isn’t _wrong_. She would split them front-to-back in a heartbeat if it means taking Mira H.Q. down a notch.

But someone _is_ here, radiating that strange, appealing emotion. It makes her stomach growl. She sits up and looks over her shoulder in time to see a dark figure approach her bench. Instantly, the Impostor’s mind is on alert: she snaps upright and stares at the station’s captain. Obsidian doesn’t greet her verbally; he simply nods and takes a seat on the far end of the bench. It is bold and brash and brazen for a naut to do a day after someone’s body is found. For all he knows— _she’s_ the murderer!

Which she is. Gray doesn’t dissuade the fact in her mind. She killed Orange, and she took her sweet time doing it. Orange’s involvement with Mira was undeniably heinous; she spliced the logs before picking him as a target. The things she saw him admit to…

“You shouldn’t be alone when there’s an Impostor onboard.” The captain’s voice is quiet and reflective.

Gray stiffens. “What’s it to you?”

“You’re my… third-in-command. I need you alive and intact.” Obsidian shifts in his seat, leaning forward and resting his hands on his knees. His helmet obscures his face. It doesn’t stop the sweet, faintly spicy aroma from wafting out of his suit.

Gray squints at him. _Longing?_

What does a captain long after? She can’t recall hearing him talk about a family or significant other.

 _A pet?_ Obsidian doesn’t seem like a naut who owns dogs. A cat, maybe. Not a dog.

The captain turns his helmet her direction. She can’t see beyond the darkened visor, but she feels his gaze locked on her form. It sends a shiver down her spine. Gray’s hands tense and she asks, “You aren’t afraid of the Impostor, captain?”

“I didn’t say that.” Obsidian’s response is immediate. “I am afraid, but I know there are worse things in the universe than an alien species.”

The thought intrigues her. She crosses her legs and cocks her head to one side. Her helmet obfuscates her face, but the gesture gets across. “Like what?”

“Mira.” The captain’s voice drops to a whisper.

Gray visibly tenses. Her breath catches in her throat and she realizes she made a mistake not rebuking him. Only Impostors have qualms with Mira H.Q. Gray's body floods with panic and she glances at the cafeteria exits for others. She hears faint chatter; a different scent, rich and permeating, floods her heightened senses. _Others nearby. Approaching cafeteria. Can’t kill, can’t kill, can’t kill!_

“Gray—” Obsidian begins, but cuts off when Gray leaps to her feet.

She sucks in a deep breath, mind racing. _Spicy with a note of sweet. Longing. He… Does he?_

“Come with me,” she begs. Obsidian hesitates; she grabs his wrist and tilts her helmet to face his. _“Please,_ captain.”

She expects resistance, maybe the man laughing at her, but to her bewilderment and relief, Obsidian nods, rises to his feet, and lets her pull him out of the cafeteria. Gray doesn’t know where’s she going, but she knows she needs someplace _private._ The kill must be quick, quiet, and clean; she needs time to sneak to a crowded area and blend in. An alibi. That means unconventional means of taking a naut down, but to hell with the rules. It’s not like Mira follows their own rules for massacring her species, or dissecting her kin alive, or testing on others like her in attempts to understand and replicate the shapeshifting attribute common across all Impostors.

Her chest fills with resolve. She can smell the _longing_ deeply now, mixing in with other things the Impostor isn’t sure how to feel about. Her heart flutters strangely when she tastes the spice on her togue; it is inviting and indulgent. Her mouths salivate but her composure holds. She spots a doorway leading to the medical bay. A quick peek confirms no one inside. Obsidian doesn’t question her as she pulls the captain into the room and releases him long enough to input a code to shut the doors. She feels eyes on her as she exhales and turns around.

The captain is cautious. His unease melds into the longing, two conflicted feelings playing with fire.

“What—What do you need, Gray?” His voice strains.

“To talk to you,” she plays coy, bashfully looking to the side. “…Captain.”

It isn’t the right move. The man tenses, caution returning. She needs him to lower his guard to reduce the chances of the kill being… _messy._

_Get his guard down. Helmet off. I’ll sever the vocal cords, then the spine. Quick and easy. Take the vent to the generator room. Backtrack to security. Erase the camera footage of us together…_

“Don’t tiptoe around the subject.” Obsidian’s voice is firmer this time. His wits are returning to him; she needs to move faster. She needs to kill.

“I’ve been thinking of you,” Gray says, soft and shy. It isn't her nature but she throws up a facade of nervousness and demure. The confession works, or it takes the captain aback; his figure shudders. Gray uses it as an opportunity to get closer, taking a step, then another, and finally stopping in front of him. She slowly skims a finger down his chest, stopping it over his heart. The _thump thump thump_ entrances her, dissuading the need to kill a moment. “…I can't get you out of my head, Captain Obsidian.”

Obsidian shudders when she says his title. He hesitates before his hand rises and wraps around hers.

Gray smiles behind her helmet. It's working. It's... 

Nice.

The heat flutters in her belly. What was a docile, passive sensation begins to twist and coil. The warmth rises and grows when Obsidian squeezes her hand. She pauses as he leans forward. 

“Do you... remember anything?” Obsidian inquires. He squeezes her hand again. "About me? About... us?"

 _Us?_ She has no idea what he refers to. Her thoughts swarm, distracted by the idea of not knowing and distracted by the feeling of gloved fingers brushing her knuckles. Her suit is an extension of herself; what shouldn't derive _sensations_ for nauts is a warm, soft, _personal_ touch to an Impostor. She swallows, every maw in her body clenching as she wonders. _What could I be forgetting?_

She needs to kill.

“…Some things,” Gray fibs. A dizzy spell circles her head when Obsidian exhales loud enough to hear. 

“Gray—You—” The man lets go of her. He puts his hands on her shoulders and looks down at her. When he speaks, his voice is full of longing. “You _remember?_ Don’t lie to me—Please— _Please—”_

 _Am I forgetting something?_ The thought disappears as Obsidian draws back. Gray stiffens. _Doesn't he believe me?_

"I'm not lying," she swears by it, an oath breaker. "Obsidian."

"I need to see your face." Obsidian whispers. She nods; her body remains still when the naut reaches for her helmet. Something about the act of gingerly unclasping the buckles and removing the hoses sealing her helmet to her suit is almost… intimate.

She lets him take the helmet off, a sigh escaping her. Her face appears human, her hair the same as any other naut, but her eyes—She _knows_ she carries the twinkle of stars in her gaze. She feels goosebumps rise over her arms and legs, every hair standing on end on her nape as Obsidian tilts her head up, surveying her. Studying her. Looking for the lies. 

He's thorough; breathtaking. Gray loses her focus.

_I need to kill him. Kill him. I need to..._

She’s so close to his demise. She needs his helmet off. Access to his neck, sever vocal cords then the spine. Quick. Clean. Quiet.

The thoughts disappear when Obsidian takes off his helmet. The look the naut gives her is everything she tastes in the air and _more_. There is fear, not at _her_ , or maybe at her, but also at something else, at things she doesn’t know. There is longing, rich and vibrant and pure, the kind of longing she associates not with companions but on a… more personal level. And then there is the matter of memories. He looks at her with _expectation,_ as if judging her words, her actions, her, her, _her_ , and for a second the Impostor feels like she is the only star in the sky.

Pure, sweet, unconditional adoration.

 _For... me?_ Heat licks her cheeks. _What am I forgetting? What don’t I remember?_

She’s smart enough to put two and two together. The man thinks the two had… something. _What_ is beyond her, or beyond what she wants to acknowledge, but it’s enough for her to act. _Lower his guard. Get him to trust you. Clean. Quiet. Clean. Quick._

There are words nauts say to others they care about.

“Do you love me?” She asks.

The man’s eyes widen. Obsidian is still before his gaze _lights_ up like a full moon. He exhales sharply and presses his forehead down against hers. “I never... stopped.”

She intends to kill him there. Cut the vocal cords, then the spine. Quick, clean, quiet.

She hesitates. He feels warm against her forehead. His breath fans her face. The fluttery feeling twitches and pulses in her chest; she bites her lip.

_"Obsidian..."_

"You're everything to me," The man cups her face. _"Everything,_ Gray. I... I..."

Haziness clouds the corners of her vision. She forgets to breathe as the captain rubs circles into her cheeks. Obsidian draws back an inch and meets her line of sight. She follows his eyes; his gaze drops to her lips before rising again. 

"I'll die a thousand times to see you again." The captain whispers. "To have you here with me."

The Impostor's eyes widen. Her cheeks flush deeply. A voice that is hers and not hers whispers back. "Promise?"

"I promise, I'm not giving up on you," Obsidian says before he lowers his head and kisses her, sweet and soft and _gentle_.

Her hands trace his jawline, willing the man to stay a moment longer. She presses into him with a desperation blooming in her chest. The longing tastes sweet and spicy, methodical, but the _relief_ and _jubilance_ following is overwhelming in flavor. It dominates her emotional receptors and fills her with a deep-seeded warmth that spreads from the tips of her toes to the tip of her nose. She melts into the captain's arms and clutches his suit. 

When the two part, Obsidian leans against her forehead. He pants for air, breathless. Gray does the same. She can't think of words when the captain looks at her. His eyes are so beautiful: dark and full of depths, deep as the most glorious void of space. She stares at him. He does the same. Neither say a word. Obsidian waits a moment, quiet, even shy, before a _wide_ grin stretches across his lips and he kisses her again. 

_Kill him._ A voice that is not hers, _not_ the Impostor, hisses in her mind. 

_I don't want to._ She pleads, lost in the sweetness of the man's lips, his scent, him, him, _him_. She doesn't care when her back hits the wall; she is hopelessly tangled in his arms and lips. Her neck cranes up to kiss him back, briefly oblivious to the world around them. It comes naturally to her, as if it is how it has always been, as if she woke up one day knowing how to kiss, react, and _feel_ toward the captain. She feels his grin when she whispers his name. She feels his smirk when her breath hitches and her grip tightens on his face. She draws back and nuzzles his jaw, feeling him kiss a trail from her nose to the crest of her brow. It's so much, _he_ 's so much. He is everything and all encompassing and she needs more of him. When he breathes her name, her knees wobble. When he caresses her face, her hands tremble and she pulls him back into her grasp. When he kisses her, _really_ , truly kisses her, she loses herself in thoughts she can't recognize, in memories she doesn't recall, and in emotions she struggles to process. 

“I love you—” The man whispers against her lips, kissing her fervently as he says a name, _her_ name. "I love you so much. I love you—"

“What?” She breathes, breaking away long enough to meet his eyes. He’s happy; he's so happy. _She_ makes him happy.

“I love you,” Obsidian repeats, hands cupping her face once again. “So much— _Always_ —You’re everything to me. Everything—”

He kisses her again. She moans against his lips. "Obsidian. _Obsidian—"_

 _"So much,"_ the captain repeats, cupping her face. 

_KILL HIM._

It all comes back: the circumstances of the present. Her, an Impostor. He, a high-ranking naut serving Mira H.Q. This is wrong. This is so, _so wrong._ She can't process it: declarations of love, recollections of things she cannot fathom, insinuations that _don't make sense_. It's all a lie; the two never met until she arranged passage to this space station. _He_ is the one speaking nonsense; he's cast a spell on her and reeled her in close enough to touch. She's smarter than that; the woman reels backward and hisses in pain. She needs to end him before the naut sticks any other ideas in her head. She needs to kill him. **SHE NEEDS TO KILL HIM.**

 _“I can’t,”_ she chokes out suddenly, tears pricking her eyes.

Obsidian stares at her, frozen. His eyes are wide and mortified. "Gray? _Gray?"_

She hears the concern in his voice. Something in the back of her mind tells her this is normal. This is _Obsidian._ He’s always looked out for her, watched her back, cared for her. He’s always put her first. Even now—NO, NO NO. She shoves his hands away when he reaches for her. Tears streak down her face. She holds her head in her hands and screams, _“I WON'T, I WON'T, STOP IT, STOP!"_

 **_KILL HIM._ **

She panics. The Impostor's brain jumps into flight or fight mode. Her instincts possess her and her world starts to crumple. Her body cannot keep its composure as parts of it shift into the disorienting light of distant galaxies. She is a force she does not understand; she is a beacon consuming the disbelief and fear and _terror_ of the world around her. Obsidian steps back as she snaps her head and maws toward him. He shouts something at her that sounds like a _name_ but she can't process it. The rich odor of fear disgusts her but her mind hyper-fixates on it and she slurps it up like a sponge soaked in liquid. The last threads of her self-control and restraint break and she _erupts_ in a plume of bloodLUST for the naut nearby. 

He backs away from her, hands up and eyes—such beautiful, beautiful eyes—wide. His aghast expression reveals the awe, the regret, the concern _but why concern why does he care about her why why why why why?_ She can’t stand the thoughts. Sobs wrack her form. Everything and nothing steals her vision as she lashes out at the world around her and all within it. In her head, the voices of Mira H.Q. continue to whisper: _**KILL. THEM. ALL.**_

The crunch Obsidian's body makes when she crushes him is sickening.

Each crewmate makes the same sound right before she leaves a smear of their remains on the floor. When the station is finally _silent,_ when she hears neither crewmates or Impostors in her wake, Gray flickers out of the frenzy of blood and gore. Her body, an astral phenomena, glows and radiates warmth for the dead. A hand of gleaming lights rips a datapad from the torn remains of an obsidian-black spacesuit. She punches in her vote: _Gr_ _ay: one._

Her last seconds before the station’s defense system ejects her are spent sobbing.

* * *

When the captain stirs in his bed another day, Obsidian does not rise. He blinks slowly, opens his eyes, and stares at the ceiling overhead. His quarters are a silent, sullen place. He covers his eyes with one arm and grits his teeth. 

He failed, again.


	4. HYPOCRITE OATH BREAKER

Worlds pass in the blink of an eye.

Sometimes he dies before the end of the ‘round.’ He doesn’t know how it ends, only that the ending takes place when _Gray_ dies.

Sometimes Obsidian lives only to die last. Gray, intentionally or not, saves him for last many times. The captain wants to believe she does it out of a lingering memory of him in her soul, but he knows better. She doesn’t remember anything. He remembers all of her.

Sometimes the tables turn on the two and he watches Gray die. His influence as captain only goes so far. He tries to protect her, but the station is full of nauts and he is but a single man. The world ends if the crew votes Gray out. Any attempts to vouch for Gray cause crewmates to vote him out instead or causes Gray to target him after.

Sometimes he tries to explain. He looks for moments where the connection the two share is strongest. It exists somewhere: deep and full of adoration, every feeling on his end real and alive for the Impostor who can’t remember him. Gray always kills him after, or she frames him to save herself.

Sometimes Obsidian _doesn’t_ try. He gives up. He protests. He acts out of line. He foregoes the rank of _Captain_ and demands everyone treat him like a regular naut.

It doesn’t work. _Nothing_ works. The world keeps changing, but Gray continues to forget him. She continues to be the Impostor. She continues to kill him.

 _I WON’T. I WON’T. STOP IT, STOP!_ Her words from that lifetime worry him. She sounded so confused with herself. She sounded _afraid._

Even now, his first instinct is to wrap arms around her and hold her the way she once held him. He wants to kiss every tear away. He wants to comfort her. He wants _her,_ only her: a light to shine in his void.

Once upon a time—she told him those words. She was the first to say _I love you._ She protected _him_.

She sacrificed her stars trying to stop Mira. 

“I love you,” Obsidian whispers to the air, numb on the inside. Forlorn. “I’ll find a way out of this mess.”

* * *

Final five: Cyan, Mint, Red, herself, and… _him._ The captain. A man of reputation with a rank backing him up. He’s been on the Impostor’s hit list since she and Cyan first established high-priority targets, but a series of lucky encounters and _stacking_ , as Cyan irritably refers to, has kept Captain Obsidian out of the line of fire. Now, sitting just past Red on her right side, Gray struggles to keep her desire to see _crimson stains_ under control while Mint bashfully explains her side of things.

“…I finished realigning the engines. Double-checked them, too, and… And…” She’s a soft-spoke one, friendly but naïve. Her voice is uneasy as she describes her pathing up until she found the body of Yellow just outside the medical bay doors.

Cyan nods dutifully, the only one to give a response. He’s a weak Impostor; Gray has known about his _soft_ spot for the minty fresh naut beside him since she first met the Impostor on the space station. Her eyes narrow behind her visor. _She dies too. All of them. Mira never spared us. Return the favor._

“…Can you vouch for her, Cyan?” the captain hesitates. Obsidian has given no indication his vote, but his medical scan being witnessed by Mint and Cyan the previous week ensures his safety in _votes_. It also makes him a ‘swing’ vote, determining the Impostor’s success or increased risk of failure.

 _Then we’ll get rid of the other two. Either works. We’re so close to tearing this station to the ground._ Gray keeps herself calm as she stares at Cyan’s figure. She sees him nod at Obsidian’s question. Cyan begins a spiel about Mint’s trustworthiness, gesturing with one hand to emphasize his points. The naut next to him squeaks softly. Gray’s eyes narrow like light being ripped apart in a black hole. She notes a small movement where Cyan’s other hand meets Mint’s own on the bench. Gray wants to _retch_ when she sees Cyan run a thumb over the back of Mint’s hand.

Her spacesuit, integrated into her cosmological mass of horrors, remains intact and composed. Mint is a _later_ problem; she can talk reason into Cyan. What comes _now_ is voting Red out; she’s the only viable option given the captain’s medical scan.

But first she needs to clear her name. She hasn’t had the chance to explain her route or clear suspicion. The recent murder is _her_ work; she anticipates the challenge. Gray knows the time has come when Cyan turns to her. The other Impostor nods stiffly. Gray sits upright and clears her throat. _“_ Alright. Guess you want to drill me with questions, huh?”

“You and Red haven’t said a word this meeting.” Cyan states, voice icy.

Gray tenses. She looks at Obsidian. “—You said the body’s in the generator room?”

“Medical bay.” Obsidian corrects.

“Right. My bad.” Gray winces. A slip-up. She hopes the nauts don’t notice. Cyan _will_ vote to eject her if thing’s look bad; _asshole_.

“I was in security,” she decides to play the role of _watchdog._ “If any of you bothered to look up, you would have seen the camera lights blinking.”

“I walked past the security room! You weren’t there—The lights weren’t on!” Red interjects and throws her hands on the table. She seethes. _“You’re a liar,_ Gray!”

“Fuck off, Red,” Gray snaps back, playing up the ichor easily. “You’re the liar! If you came by the security office, then I would see you on cameras! Unless you used the vent—”

“I _can’t_ access the vent, asshole! Only high-ranking officers know the code to unlock it! You, Cyan, and the Captain!”

“Like that’s stopped an Impostor before,” Gray shouts. She needs to escalate the situation before her lies fall apart. Paint Red as the fibber. She doesn’t hesitate to shove a finger in Red’s face. _“You were the one who killed Gold, weren’t you?_ He was always pushing your buttons, making you justify every fucking move—You had to kill him to get suspicion off your back!”

“I didn’t kill anyone,” Red smacks her hand away. “But I bet _you_ did! That’s a clever move faking the cameras! But if we go and check the _footage_ I bet you’ll see _no one’s been in the room_ since Yellow’s death! Right, Obsidian? Why don’t ya remind Gray here about the new security protocol?"

_Fuck._

Cold sweat runs down Gray’s nape. She sees Cyan tense up next to her, picking up on the realization. The station captain locked the security room doors after the body was located fearing an Impostor might erase the camera footage. She should’ve picked a different room. She’s fucked. She’s fucked to the furthest reach of the universe. Her thoughts race as she looks around the room in desperation. She wonders how fast she can kill a naut before the station’s defense system terminates her.

 _And they were so close to taking over the station!_ Her body simmers inside her suit. _I need to kill_ —

“I locked the security office. _But,”_ Obsidian’s helmet angles to face Gray. She feels his gaze on her, bearing down like a heavy wave. “I gave Gray the code to access the room.”

“You gave her the—The _third_ in command?!” Red sounds full of disbelief. “Captain—”

“Maybe she was in the room.” Cyan offers smoothly. “Perhaps _you_ were caught in a lie… Red.”

“She just lied about—About—Cyan! Captain! Captain, it’s Cyan and Gray—It has to be!” Red shouts. _“He’s covering her ass!”_

 _“Attention crewmates of the Lupis Orbital Mira Space Station: discussion time has ended. Voting has begun. Please input the code to skip if the activation of the Mira Defense System is accidental or no longer needed.”_ The automated assistant of the space station blares out from overhead speakers in the ceiling.

Obsidian fetches his datapad from the pouch of his spacesuit. He turns it on and nods at the others. “Let the votes decide.”

“—It’s her, it has to be,” Red repeats, hissing and gesturing at Gray. “And Cyan’s covering for her! Bastard!”

“What do you think?” Mint asks softly, nervous.

Gray nearly rips her fellow Impostor in half when she sees Cyan boldly place a hand over Mint’s on the table. The other Impostor pauses. “—I think… Red is lying to us.”

 _“What?!”_ The naut _snarls._ “Don’t listen to him, Mint!”

The votes are punched in amidst squabbling. Gray enters hers last. She grips her datapad tightly as the screen reads out the results. _Obsidian: zero. Cyan: zero. Mint: zero. Gray: two. Red: three._

Her eyes widen. Someone voted for her. Someone voted for Cyan. But _three_ on Red? Which crewmate was the swinging vote? Which crewmate believed her nonsense?

Gray doesn’t have time to contemplate it. A cry of horror rings as Red stands and staggers backward. She looks around wildly for an escape but the turrets unfurl from the ceiling.

The woman is ejected a minute later. Her sobs last until she is sucked out of the airlock. When it seals and the other side of the airlock opens into the storage room, the two Impostors look at each other knowingly.

Mint stands next to Cyan, her hand in his own and squeezing it _tightly_ , while Obsidian keeps his distance from the duo. Gray positions herself between the lot. For all the shit Cyan’s given her in the past over forming attachments to _nauts_ , nothing could be more hypocritical than the blatant display of affection in front of her. She decides then and there that Mint will be the first to go. She won’t let another Impostor be weakened by the bond the two possess.

 _“Cyan,”_ Gray says, attention fixated on her Impostor partner.

“Did—We got the right one? We did? Right?” Mint ignores the seething Impostor and turns to Cyan. She is his height, but his _suit_ gives him height on her. When he doesn’t answer, Mint begins to tremble. “Cyan—Cyan? Cyan? We got the right one? Cyan?”

He’s contemplating. Deciding.

Gray knows in a second his mind is made up. She sees the hesitation. The lack of transformation. The absence of blood-curling screams or cries of agony. Cyan wants to _keep her._

 _“You can’t!”_ Gray snaps, snarling at her Impostor. _“All of them—All of them—No survivors!”_

 _“Rules can be broken,”_ the second in command rebukes her. _“You know this—”_

 _“Shut the fuck up! I don’t know what bullshit the captain’s on,”_ Gray’s body twitches and her central maw begins to take shape draping across a seam on the stomach of her ‘suit’. She ignores Mint’s cry of alarm and jabs a finger in Cyan’s direction _. “Why he—Why he did any of it—It doesn’t matter—They’re both Mira’s!”_

 _“And I want this one,_ ” Cyan growls. He pulls Mint into his grasp, shifting her to cower behind him. _“Kill the Captain. This one stays.”_

“Cy—Cyan,” Mint clings to the Impostor’s side, the sound of crying following.

It clicks in Gray’s head. Her entire mass _explodes_ in a sudden transformation of a humanoid figure to an amalgamation of starstuff. She screams and roars at the other Impostor, _“You befriended a naut—You told her—When?! When did she know?! When did you tell her?!”_

Her words are no longer a human tongue. She speaks in an ancient language transcendent of any sound produced by a naut’s vocal cords. The Impostor’s tendrils snap and _smash_ into the metal panels of the storage room. Cyan pushes Mint back and hisses, _“Get away from here—I’ll handle this!”_

“But—But I don’t want to leave you,” Mint pleads with him. “Cyan!”

The Impostor huffs knowingly and begins to transform. Naut body parts and the crew spacesuit rip and tear, buckling and giving way to the gleaming cyan glow beneath. Like Gray, the other Impostor is a _star_ , gleaming so brightly the nauts present must shield their eyes and recoil away. 

_“I’ll rip her to pieces in front of you,”_ Gray screams. _“Scatter her like the stars!”_

* * *

The clash of lights takes out two walls and one minor structural support before either Impostor starts to strain. The force of each blow is enough to ring worse than tinnitus in either naut’s ears. Mint cries out in fear as she stands at the edge and watches the conflict unfold. She sees a thousand shooting stars rip and wrangle as ancient cosmological entities duel to the death.

“Cyan—Cyan, _please!”_ She whispers her plea, shaking like a leaf.

Nauts are truly nothing more than specks of sand on great beaches of the horizon. The universe is infinite and expanding and it does not care for grub as insignificant as nauts. Mira H.Q. knows so, _so_ little; it is enough to make most laugh. Mint’s stomach drops in the pit of her stomach as she watches a tiny solar flare enshroud Cyan’s mass and burn through a portion of the cafeteria. She needs to do something. She _needs_ to help him!

Her gaze sweeps the cafeteria. On a table against the farthest window of the cafeteria is a datapad. She recognizes the cracked screen belonging to Yellow. _Could I—?_

Mint hears a scream of pain. She tears into a run and bolts for the table, never realizing the scream doesn't belong to Cyan.

* * *

She’s losing.

She thought an Impostor could only be bested by another Impostor.

She thought her species didn’t possess a _hierarchy._

Like the stars across the great canvas of space, Impostors share in the diversity. She isn’t the same degree as Cyan. She is a dwarf and he a supernova.

She’s losing.

In the distance, a flash of black slams into a mint spacesuit.

* * *

Mint cries out as the body collides with her own and knocks her flat. Obsidian’s foot connects with the datapad and it goes _flying_ out of reach. Mint screams into her suit, “No! No! Cyan! _Cyan!”_

* * *

Even supernovae die.

Energy transfers from one state of matter to another.

Mint’s voice triggers an exothermic reaction in Cyan’s star.

Beneath him, Gray’s astral form throws him off and she climbs to her feet. Her body glows brighter than ever before.

* * *

The woman sobs while Obsidian strides away. He is breathless against the disorienting blasts of radiation left in the wake of two dueling Impostors. He retrieves his own datapad from his suit pocket. The man fumbles navigating the system; he inputs an authorization code to skip discussion time and taps his vote into the ensuing screen.

* * *

The station’s defense system powers on and processes the single vote.

_“Executing judiciary protocol zeta. Please proceed to the ejection site crew member C-Y-A-N-0-1 or you will be terminated.”_

_“Gray!”_ Obsidian shouts at the forces of cosmological horror. When he gets no reply, he _screams_ her name—

* * *

She knows that voice. She knows the name. Her entire mass writhes and throws itself to the side, seeking out the dark-suited figure and wrapping all of herself in him as the station’s defense system opens fire on Cyan. The sounds are terrible for mortal and immortal ears. Gray finds her thoughts fade to nothing until only _his_ name remains. She clings to it, ensnaring the man to her and holding on to him like they might never meet again.

When the sounds cease, Gray opens her eyes. She is a shining star, but her form has been reduced and forced back into something vaguely naut-like, helmet and outer suit absentee. Her arms remain wrapped around Obsidian’s figure, but Cyan’s demise has shattered the man’s visor. His spacesuit is torn and shredded in many places. The man’s backup O2 tank hisses as oxygen escapes a torn hose. Obsidian groans and leans into her chest. Garbled syllables fall from his tongue.

 _“You,”_ Gray whispers when she remembers what she is and where they are. _“You lied for an Impostor. You saved an Impostor—”_

The man struggles in her grasp. Not to escape it, but to free himself of a broken helmet. Gray’s brows furrow and she helps him take it off before sitting him up and looking at his face. He’s familiar, in a way she cannot comprehend or recall. Her mind is torn between the strange nostalgia he provokes and the man’s past actions. She grits her teeth, central maw equally clenched as the Impostor forces out words, “Why did you help me?”

The Captain grunts weakly. He looks up at her. “…Wanted to.”

_Wanted… to…?_

_“I’m an Impostor,”_ she tells him, not shying from the fact. But she does not taste fear on him. She tastes _mirth. “…What’s funny?”_

“You’re an Impostor. Again.” Obsidian mutters. His hand lifts to her face and he caresses her jawline. “Still… beautiful.”

 _“You hit your head—”_ Gray begins, a fluttery feeling seizing control of her. She suddenly hears a heartbeat in her ears. She becomes aware of the two’s proximity, of his _closeness,_ of how tempting it is to lean forward and examine the station Captain a little more closely. _“I—You shouldn’t have done that. I’m an Impostor. I’ll kill you—”_

“Again?” Obsidian cuts her off. His brows rise. “Go ahead. I… fucked up. Failed.”

Nothing he says makes sense, but his blatant disregard for death intrigues her. Gray swallows and tears her gaze from his eyes, but it only drops to his lips. Her brain swarms under invading thoughts, under impulses she wasn’t aware she could feel.

 _“Why did,”_ she begins, but it comes out a whisper. _“Why—You helped me? Lied for—Me?”_

 _HYPOCRITE._ A voice screeches in her mind.

“He wanted to vote you out.” Obsidian mumbles. He leans his head against her chest and breathes in deeply. “Your… partner.”

 _Cyan._ She had _two_ votes on her.

If the captain tells the truth then… Red _definitely_ didn’t vote herself out. Mint followed Cyan’s cue. She voted for Red.

A look of horror crawls on her face.

Cyan voted for her. Cyan and Red voted for her. If Obsidian hadn’t swung the vote against Red, if he hadn’t lied, if he hadn’t _helped_ her then… Then…

 _“Why?”_ Her eyes, wide, lock on his.

His eyes are beautiful. They remind her of the void of the universe: deep, dark, infinite. When she looks closely, she sees tiny lights blinking in the distance. She hears the man’s breath hitch and suddenly becomes aware of how close she is to the naut. Gray’s face burns with heat and she swallows but repeats her question. _“Why, captain?”_

“You wouldn’t believe me if I told you.” Obsidian murmurs softly.

 _“Try me.”_ Gray says.

The man pauses.

 _“I won’t kill you,”_ the Impostor vows, an oath breaker to the end.

“Mira’s not who they say,” The man caresses her face with one hand, tentative but _longing_. “Not who they—Swear to be. I know this now. I’m not… Excusing my actions here. But I know now—I want—I _need_ to do right by the worlds.”

It leaves her speechless. Her first instinct is to cut his throat and watch the light fade from his pretty eyes. Her bloodlust screams in rage, but her self-restraint holds even as the voice fills her head: _KILL HIM KILL HIM KILL HIM **KILL HIM YOU HYPOCRITE.**_

She weighs the pros and cons of letting him live a _little_ longer. Her gaze narrows when her mind comes to a sudden conclusion. She lifts her hand to remove his but finds herself momentarily lost in thoughts not her own. Her hand grips his and keeps it there. Part of her revels in the _touch_. He feels boiling hot, like a flame licking her skin. As the moment drags on, Gray can’t help but drop her head down and rest her forehead against his. She exhales when the man’s breath hitches.

* * *

 _“You’re confusing me,”_ the Impostor whispers. _“Who are you?”_

Obsidian’s lips curve into a bittersweet smile. He tells her his name, his _real_ name.

* * *

 _“I…”_ Gray’s head is foggy. She lets go of the man’s hand and cups his face. _“Do I—Know you?”_

* * *

“You could say that,” The captain says. 

_“Captain..."_ She’s as breathless as he is.

Obsidian’s hand slips into her hair. He strokes it gently, willing every ounce of warmth and hope and _love_ to reach her and _remember_. 

“Please,” Obsidian whispers against her. “Remember me.”

* * *

Gray’s eyes well with tears. Unsaid words seize her tongue as the lights in her eyes come full circle.

 _“I do,”_ the woman cries. _“I remember.”_

“—Took you long enough,” Obsidian cracks a weak smile, every bit as endearing now as it was the first time she saw him.

Gray crushes her lips against his. Obsidian's body tenses before relief overtakes him. His lips taste as sweet now as they did when she first fell in love with him an eternity ago. Gray draws back enough to apologize but Obsidian cuts her off by capturing her lips in a new embrace. Gray's hands move from his jawline to his head. She feels the growing coils of hair and runs her fingers over them desperately, terrified he might fade from her side.

Obsidian parts long enough to hush her, “Shh—Shh—It’s okay, we’re okay, we’re going to be okay.”

“I’m so sorry,” she repeats, shifting to wrap arms around his chest and hold him close. “I failed—I failed you—I—”

“I don’t blame you for anything, it’s okay,” Obsidian pecks her jawline and wipes away her tears. “I love you, I’ll _always love you.”_

Gray can’t think of a reply. She foregoes words and kisses him again. The two wind up tangled in each other, entranced and oblivious to everything around them but each other.

 _“_ _Mira H.Q. Defense System online… Target identified. Executing judiciary protocol zeta…”_

The two freeze at the sound of the station’s defense system automatically starting. Gray tears herself from him and snaps her head up. Across the cafeteria, clutching Yellow’s datapad, Mint stands trembling. The naut sobs through her helmet as she holds the datapad up for them to see.

_Obsidian: zero. Mint: zero. Gray: one._

_**“No!”** _Gray and Obsidian scream in unison, but it is too late. 

The plasma turrets open fire.


	5. animosity EATS YOU ALIVE pt 1

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tw for:  
> -torture and imprisonment in the very first section   
> -alcohol use at the end  
> -murder and blood  
> -veeeeeery brief implied sexual content
> 
> thanks for reading!

Sleek white suits and chrome-covered helmets flicker through the man’s mind. Gloved hands grip his vessel’s limbs and dissonant whispers trickle into his consciousness. He is not alright. He doesn’t understand. His eyes are half-lidded under exhaustion and pain but when the light comes on and his mind _remembers_ , the fighting starts again. A flame burns out and the pain— _ungodly, unbearable—_ rakes his back until he screams.

 _“He’s waking up,”_ Mira radios overhead. Light flashes in his eyes and he moans in agony. _“Your move, sir.”_

 _“Put him under.”_ Mira speaks with itself, a dozen voices all their own.

“No,” he pleads and sobs. White suits grip his vessel and force him forward. He is too weak to resist them. When the crucible rises from the holding chamber, Mira orders him to enter. Starstuff filters through the air. He screams and weeps when a blast of plasma burns a hole through his back.

 _“Stubborn.”_ Mira says.

_“Make a note. His vitality shot up—He’s resisting instructions!”_

_“What should we do?”_ Mira asks itself. _“Sir? Awaiting your order.”_

“ _Keep him steady. I’m on my way.”_ Mira pauses. Mira puts its hands, _so many hands_ , on his vessel’s body. He bleeds galaxies. Mira laughs. Mira jabs him again. Mira laughs. Mira asks for clarification from its own questions.

The crucible waits for him. It is a great metal tomb. It unlocks with a loud _HISSSSSSSSSSSS_ before unfolding a walkway before Mira and him. Mira doesn’t make him march yet.

A white suit clicks footsteps as Mira comes down the corridor. The door locks behind Mira. Mira greets Mira with a nod before walking to his side and kneeling. A gloved hand wrenches his vessel’s face up. He stares into Mira’s darkened visor. _“He has fight left in him. Won’t go down easy. How long’s this vessel been here?”_

_“—The corpse arrived on the previous cargo ship. It was released after—"_

Mira talks amongst itself for a time, discussing formalities of handling dead and transporting a corpse to the off-world facility. He tries to focus. He tries to think. He needs to think. He can’t think. The plasma burns his back and reaches through rotting organs until it punctures the other side. Mira laughs to itself but quiets when it scolds itself. _“If you ruin the vessel it’ll be your head he’s stuffed into—"_

_“We need to move him.”_

_“Let me speak with him. I need to see him.”_ Mira breathes loudly.

He cowers away but Mira grabs his vessel by the neck and lifts him up. _“I know you hate us. You despise what we’ve done. But we are on the verge of something… special.”_

Mira sets him on his feet. He tries to run. Mira grabs him and throws him back toward the crucible.

“Don’t,” he begs. “Don’t—Not there—Not again!”

 _“You are going to walk in there. You are going to obey,”_ Mira is blunt as it lifts the plasma rods and points them at his body. _“Don’t make this harder than it needs to be. I can put you in more pain than you can fathom.”_

“I can’t—I can’t—Won’t—Not there—Please,” the man repeats until Mira walks forward and slaps him across the face.

Mira huffs. _“Nobody told you to speak.”_

“I’m sorry—I—” he flinches when Mira strikes him again.

 _“We can bring the light here. Do you want to see what we’ve done to the stars?”_ Mira cocks its head to one side. When he shakes his head, Mira continues. _“Good. Tell me what you are going to do.”_

“Obey,” he chokes on the word. Tears streak down the vessel’s face. “I’ll be good, I’ll _obey.”_

 _“You belong to us, captain.”_ Mira reminds him _. “You belong to Mira.”_

* * *

When he wakes up, he knows something has changed. Obsidian stares at the ceiling with tension coiling inside his chest. He stares at the light fixtures while his blood _races_. He stares at the metal panels of the ceiling while his mind spins and spirals through a cacophony of _terror_. He tastes something on his tongues; it’s a rancid emotion. _Helplessness._

 **TONGUES?** The man’s eyes widen. He sits upright and checks his stomach. Though he remains dressed in a thin thermal bodysuit, appropriate for sleepwear and activity outside a naut’s suit, the man’s jaw drop and he shudders at the realization it is not sleepwear he wears. His clothes are no more than molded pieces of skin grown to imitate the texture and thickness of the thermal suit. He gropes his abdomen and shudders involuntarily as fingers dip between a set of scars to reveal—

 _Pearly white teeth._ His central maw. Obsidian staggers up and crashes his way to the bathroom. The captain’s eyes are brilliant stars amidst the void of his skin. He curses and leans his forehead against the cracked mirror. _Why now? Why am I the Impostor?_

Obsidian doesn’t remember waking up in another reality. He knows Mira has him, but he _can’t_ remember what they’ve done.

 _Is it because of Gray?_ He knows every reaction has a trigger. If he’s the Impostor _here_ then something changed. _Because of Mint? What she did to us?_

It hurts to remember the last world.

It is nothing short of _agonizing_ to remember why it ended.

It hadn’t been because of Gray. She didn’t kill him. For once she _didn’t kill him_. She spoke with him, _listened_ , and then…

The man brings a finger to his lips. He shivers at the coil of heat in his gut. It croons at his veins and plays his nerves a symphony of pleasure. His breath hitches at the memory of her soft moan, her hands in his hair, her lips sucking on his with a tenderness neither deserve.

 **She remembered.** The one thing he wanted. She _remembered him_.

Then he lost her, again.

Failed her, again.

Fucked up, again.

The circumstances of their repeating world continue to evolve.

He sounds out _her_ name on his lips. Instantly the influence of Mira makes itself know. He is a cosmological creation, a breathtaking arc of stars amidst celestial orbits, but the heavenly void, the deep entrenches of space, is not without Mira’s voice. He is a falling star; Mira’s claws are sunk deep in his flesh and no matter how much he dissuades and rebukes the urge to _hunt her find her kill her taste her_ the voices in his head continue to sing. Mira calls for her death. Mira urges him to give in to unnatural urges.

He knows this is not who he is. He is an Impostor, but Impostors are not _bloodthirsty._ He does not prey on the crimson gush which erupts whenever he slits a throat or removes a head from its body. The bloodlust is artificial: a phenomenon created by Mira, enforced by Mira, _dictated by Mira_ , with him as Mira’s unwilling perpetrator.

It triggers a headache. Obsidian arches his back and stretches his limbs as he shoves the cruel thoughts into his gullet. He ignores the _thump thump thump_ of an artificial heart when he imagines Gray. Sweat beads at his forehead. Mira’s voices rise in volume in his head.

FIND HER.

KILL HER.

**FIND HER.**

**KILL HER.**

_“No,”_ Obsidian growls at himself. _“Not her!”_

But he wants to. He’s desperate to track the woman down and see her again. It’s too easy with his heightened Impostor senses; he already knows which scent belongs to Gray. He knows her quarters and the connecting ventilation shaft. He knows her. He wants her. **KILL HER.**

He yearns to devour every inch of her flesh. His mind swirls with thoughts of absolution, where the man buries her in his void and fills all the cracks and crevices until her world collapses. He is filled with an unnatural rage to shoot stars in her name and strike moons from the heavens. The awareness fills him with horror. He clamps a hand over his mouth and clenches his teeth until veins POP from his forehead.

Mira knows the soft spot in his side. Mira knows the Achilles heel. Mira knows. Mira knows. Mira knows.

 _What have they done to me?_ He clamps his eyes shut. His breathing grows ragged. _“Fuck!_ I—Calm down, calm down—Breathe, _breathe, damnit!_ You’re stronger than this! You’re strong—"

His datapad sits on a small night table to the left of his bed. It lights up. _One new message from: Crewmate G-R-A-Y-0-2._

“Fuck,” the man repeats when he sees it.

* * *

_Captain, we need to talk._

Sent by **CREWMATE G-R-A-Y-0-2.**

* * *

History here is different.

He doesn’t know how long he’s been the Captain of the Lupus Orbital Space Station, home to the infamous Mira H.Q. nauts. The company apparently stationed him here a year ago, roughly approximating three-hundred-sixty-six days given a recent leap year on the homeworld. He is the second naut assigned the Black suit; his crewmate tag is O-B-S-I-D-I-A-N-0-2 for that reason. He was not well-received by the station’s occupants but following a breach in security where an Impostor got through and murdered four nauts, the Captain finally has the attention and respect of the crew.

It was his vote that allowed the crewmates to eject the Impostor posing as a naut called White.

The irony is cruel and callous.

While his datapad fills him in on his most recent lifetime, he finds little information on the _rest_ of the crew outside the Impostor incident. The only other records available to him are the quarantine forms filled out and signed by all nauts upon arrival. Gray’s puts her arriving one month after the White incident.

 _Does she remember me?_ Obsidian’s dark, twinkling gaze flits across the datapad. He turns off the device and shoves it back into a newly formed pocket of his spacesuit. It feels weird and out of place; his spacesuit is a mixture of alloys integrated into the starstuff of his natural amorphous form. It feels like something is under his skin in a _very_ unpleasant way as the datapad shifts and rubs against the inner fold of his pocket.

 _What does she want to talk about?_ Obsidian steps out of his quarters late in the morning, fully suited for a day of faking tasks and monitoring the station for Impostors. _Does she remember?_

 _No._ He argues with himself as he walks. _Mira will kill her before it lets her remember._

Though the man initially walks with no set destination, it comes as mild surprise he finds the ashen gray naut waiting for him in the cafeteria. She sits on a bench at a table against the far window, with her head propped up on her forearm while she leans against the table. Her helmet faces the stars, but the _moment_ his footsteps echo, the naut pushes herself upright and looks over.

He knows her, but he pretends not to when he approaches and takes a seat to her far right. He positions himself so it is easy to get up and rush the exit if necessary.

“Captain,” Gray’s voice is full of ire. “I’ve wasted an hour waiting for you.”

 _She… doesn’t remember._ Obsidian’s gaze shifts to the stars beyond the station’s great glass windows.

“I was preoccupied… Gray,” the captain clears his throat. “I only saw your message now. What do you need?”

“What do you think I need?”

 _Me,_ Obsidian begs the thought.

“I don’t know.” He offers carefully.

Gray’s hands tense. She pulls up the visor on her helmet and hisses at him, a mess of her cute face and cute hair and cute _everything_ a mess with her angry expression. “Cyan! _Cyan,_ Captain. Forgive my _outburst_ , but your second-in-command needs to _fucking_ _stop_. You see the task schedule for the week? I counted no less than ten tasks for me, in a _day_. Half of them are in the generator room—”

* * *

It turns out the woman doesn’t want to talk about them, about the worlds, or even about Mira. She just wants to talk about _Cyan_ and his _absurd scheduling problems_.

And, in a way, it is exactly what Obsidian needs: a reminder the world is not always wretched. Gray trusts him enough to confide in him privately. Her memories are gone, but the feelings within them remain. The sliver of trust is enough to tame the rising curve of emotions he feels inside. He clings to it, a light in the darkest underwater trenches. When the rest of his thoughts flicker out, the bloodlust inside him is a quenched beast, too distracted by the thought of her to act against his wishes.

* * *

“I’ll speak with Cyan.” The Captain’s face remains obfuscated behind his visor, but the tone of his voice hints at cooperation. A pleasant outcome, even if it means addressing a high-ranking officer of _Mira._

The company name burns on her tongues. Gray excuses herself at the end of the conversation and walks briskly to the medical bay. She busies herself filling out drawling logs and forms of consent, the hideous irony of it all never lost to her. Gray finishes under an hour, just before her datapad buzzes with a notification for _lunch_.

It isn’t lunch. It isn’t _her_ lunch, rather. She bites her lip and stares at the screen before shoving the device back into one of her suit’s awkward pockets. Her desire to feed is only complicated by her desire to _kill_ , and right now she knows she cannot have it both ways. Murdering a crewmate to feed on their intoxicating _terror_ is a move she cannot come back from. If she kills, it _must_ be with an escape route available, an alibi on hand, and easy access to the _damn_ security room where the camera footage is stored.

 _If I befriend the Captain… I could get him alone. Figure out the code to the security room. Use him either for an alibi or take him out in one swoop._ The thought tempts her greatly.

Captain Obsidian, as he is aptly named, possesses an impressive track record at the station. His involvement in the death of one of her species, an Impostor under the alias _White_ , paints him as a prime target to take out during her time onboard the station.

 _Not yet._ She reminds herself, twiddling her thumbs as she waits in the medical bay for her vial samples to finish processing. _Not yet. Not yet. Need to get him alone. Get him alone. Look for an opening._

* * *

Small meetings and brief interactions provide no opportunities to kill. Most of her _crewmates_ are beyond forming friendships, and those that seek out a companion do so in group settings. Trios are most common but occasionally groups of five linger in the cafeteria. She understands why, but it frustrates her she cannot find a kill. She needs to make a move on taking apart the station and sabotaging Mira H.Q., but there’s no indication of another Impostor onboard.

No one she can trust to help her.

Begrudgingly, the Impostor turns back to the thoughts of using the crewmates for alibis. Most aren’t interested. Cyan is particularly egregious with her in dismissing her desire to get to know him or the naut constantly peeking out from behind him. The latter, a naut named Mint, appears _terrified_ of everyone. Gray decides the two aren’t worth her while.

Others, such as the rational but passive Magenta, or the cocky Gold and his feisty head-butting pal Scarlet, are possibilities, but Gray struggles to form any _trust_ with the lot no matter what she says or does. She knows part of it is her demeanor; she is a loud-mouthed, stubborn lass who isn’t afraid to knock others over if they disrespect her.

That, or the crewmates have a sixth sense for her ulterior motives.

It is sheer coincidence she bumps into Obsidian days after the two’s cafeteria encounter. Gray doesn’t think to apologize before she stumbles back, straightens upright, and glares through her helmet— “What the fuck _gives—_ ”

Obsidian cocks his head to one side. The angle of his helmet makes it impossible to see anything through the suit’s visor.

“Captain.” Gray realizes. She pauses, bites her tongue, then curses mentally. Her luck would have it the two ran into each other at one of the busiest junctions of the station. If it were an isolated place, she could have made a kill and gotten away with it.

“…Gray.” Obsidian’s voice is transmitted through the suit, slightly muffled but deep and imposing, nonetheless. He carries himself with a strange air of authority, the kind which Gray _despises_ on a naut.

“Don’t let me stand in your way,” the woman steps to the side and gestures for him to pass. “Captain.”

She expects him to go. When he takes a step, her aggravation cools, but it’s replaced by surprise when the man stops, faces her, and inquires, “—I spoke with Cyan.”

“Did you?” Gray blinks, mind struggling to piece together what he refers to before the two’s meeting in the cafeteria floats to the surface.

“I did.” Obsidian nods once, stiff. “He cannot change the… _schedule_ for the week, but after the weekend passes, he’s given his word to revisit the tasks allocated to each… crewmate.”

The man pauses and words fall flat between the two. Gray freezes in place, mind temporarily thrown into a stupor. Her heightened senses as Impostor tells her _many_ things, but she cannot think of any of them when Obsidian crosses to her.

“Don’t,” the man breathes, voice strained and stressed and _frustrated_. “—Let the nauts see you here, Gray.”

She feels the touch of a hand squeezing her shoulder before the Captain moves on. The Impostor stares at his back until the obsidian-suited man disappears around a corner. She cannot get the sound of her own heart roaring in her ears, nor the taste of _longing_ out of her mouth. Her body feels electrified, heightened to a state beyond what it already is, and the cosmic aberration takes a long minute to recollect herself and ignore the flurry of thoughts and feelings swarming her head.

“What the fuck was that?” She asks herself under breath.

Gray’s twinkling eyes narrow behind her helmet. She looks in the direction the Captain came from. The Impostor hesitates before taking several silent steps toward it. Eventually, the woman walks down the corridor. She doesn’t see anyone, which surprises her given the intersection of crucial hallways and corridors necessary to navigate the space station. As she trudges further two things become obvious.

Her datapad begins to vibrate in the fleshy pocket of her integrated spacesuit, alerting her to critical malfunctions in the O2 system by the generator room.

The second is the scent of blood: rich, heavy, and thick enough to make her multiple mouths want to retch. She doesn’t derive pleasure from the growing metallic scent. As she tracks it down the woman realizes smudged footsteps trek the area she comes from, indicating someone came from the area recently. A concerned thought flits through her head but the Impostor shoves it down and rounds a corner. She sees, off to one side, the faint smear of blood stopping abruptly at a panel covering an inactive trash chute. Her eyes widen and she runs over to check it, ripping the panel open with strength reminiscent of a planet’s gravitational pull. 

“Fuck me sideways,” the woman blurts out as she stares at the bloody, swollen corpse of a green-suited crewmate. She doesn’t recognize the face. The helmet is cracked in pieces and shoved into the chute’s holding container.

 _Did he do this?_ Her heart thumps wickedly in her chest. _The Captain? He’s a murderer!_

Technically, so is _she._ The Impostor has no right judge. She grits her teeth as she forces the panel covering the trash chute shut.

 _But I do it for the right reasons,_ she thinks, reflecting on her own desire to see the company _Mira_ suffer losses until it crashes and burns. She knows every shareholder and corporate executive in the company _deserves it,_ deserves it _so fucking bad_ for massacring her kin, torturing her species, conducting cruel and unethical experiments in the name of science. Mira _deserves_ it.

 _Did that naut deserve it?_ The answer must be yes, because the naut worked for Mira, and Mira deserves no mercy.

 _I would have killed them quickly._ Gray thinks to herself. _Make it painless. Or… less painful._

In the end she doesn’t get answers but questions. When the ‘day’ is done and nauts retire to their quarters, Gray stops briefly at Obsidian’s before moving on. She never notices the peephole in the door, or the twinkling eyes of an Impostor with blood on his hands.

* * *

“…Green hasn’t been seen all morning.” Mint’s whisper doesn’t escape Obsidian’s heightened senses. He takes a tray of company issued nutritional packages and makes to sit at the table across from Cyan and Mint.

The latter, notably Cyan, pause and stare at him. Cyan’s helmet, on the table, reveals the man’s crisp brown skin and fine blond hair swept back in a strange updo. His blue eyes are locked on Obsidian’s form and betray just how _irritated_ he is that the Captain interrupts his time with Mint.

Obsidian ignores the look and undoes the hoses and clasps sealing his helmet to his suit. He takes it off and inhales deeply to calm every shifting cell in his body. Retaining the appearance of a _naut_ while being an Impostor is never easy, but it is necessary.

 _Especially when I murdered someone last night._ The thought haunts him.

“I’m sure Green is fine.” Obsidian interjects with no hesitation, choosing to make himself part of the two’s discussion. Cyan continues to glare while Mint winces and clings tighter to Cyan’s arm.

“B—But what if he _isn’t?_ ” Mint blurts out, voice little more than a squeak.

He doesn’t hold grudges for the past in these worlds, but Obsidian wants nothing more than to rip her to shreds for her actions in another life. The Impostor takes a deep breath and holds himself together long enough to rip open his primary nutritional packet. It is a flavorless loaf reminding him of a food called _tofu_ found on the naut’s homeworld.

Obsidian nibbles the loaf of nutritional _stuff_ and ignores Mint as she peppers Cyan with more soft-spoken questions. To his ire, Cyan in this world seems as fixated on Mint as the last: his second-in-command is usually a neutral, level-headed man with a sharp eye on things around him and little humor to spare. Around the shyer crewmate, he seems to soften, like a rock on an ocean shore being caressed by the waves. Cyan gives the woman little glances and brief— _very_ brief—smiles. He addresses each of her concerns as neutrally as possible, but it is obvious to Obsidian how much the crewmate bathes in the attention Mint gives him.

Cyan likes to play hero with Mint as the damsel in distress.

Obsidian resists rolling his eyes when Cyan leans over to whisper something in Mint’s ear about… He doesn’t want to listen. He continues to eat, acting nonchalant but professional while his second-in-command and the anxious crewmate with him continue to talk between one another.

It isn’t until he sees Cyan lean over and brush his lips against Mint’s forehead that the Captain intervenes. He clears his throat, slipping back into his own façade of control and composure, before he inputs, “The H.Q. doesn’t permit relationships between colleagues. You would be wise to cease ministrations before they find out.”

He hears Gold yell _fuck off_ from across the cafeteria, and is mid-way rising from the table to order the man back to his cabin for _disorderly conduct_ when he hears Scarlet shout at him to _fuck off with the nonsense._ Obsidian decides to sit back down, too distracted by the mess of _Cyan_ and _Mint_ as well as the murder of _Green_ to bother anymore. He sees Cyan’s hand ensnare Mint’s own on the table, the latter making a tiny squeak when he does, and Obsidian knows it is a taunt.

 _When did he get so confrontational?_ Obsidian’s eyes narrow on the duo. _Did… Mira make him this way? Did Mira make him into this? Is it a side effect of the last world?_

“Cyan. I won’t repeat myself.” The Captain states coolly, ignoring the latter’s glare when it falls on him again. Cyan seems capable of switching his emotions on a dime: going from the sweet-tasting affection he carries for Mint to the burnt overtone of _ire_ in a heartbeat. 

The anger in Cyan’s eyes is rich in spices, every bit as nourishing to the Captain as nutritional blocks are to actual nauts. He revels in it briefly, hunger satiated, before watching Cyan let Mint’s hand go.

“Yes, Captain. Whatever you say, _sir._ ” Cyan spits, seething with vitriol. It isn’t a flavor Obsidian enjoys.

* * *

That evening Obsidian tastes lust in the air when he walks by Mint’s quarters on the way back to his own. His hands tense into fists and for a moment he considers interrupting the scene and claiming concern over hearing cries from the outside. It sickens him to no end to think that two _nauts_ get to indulge in the beauty and warmth of each other while he is left frustrated and agitated over growing bloodlust for _her_.

Artificial bloodlust injected into his veins by Mira in white suits and chrome-covered helmets. 

This world exists to punish him. Rub salt in the wounds. Freeze his hope and **s h a t t e r** his resolve.

Down the corridor linking the naut quarters, Obsidian spies the gleam of a gray spacesuit. His entire being lurches on the inside as he stares Gray down. The woman cocks her helmet to one side, waves, and enters her quarters for the evening.

The rush of blood to _everything_ comes back. His hands begin to shake. It’s so hard not to follow her to the door of her room, knock, wait, rip apart everything he sees when she opens it. It’s _so hard_ to resist the call to her flesh. Nausea of conflicted feelings and urges intersecting on opposing axis nearly keels him over. He clutches the bulge at his spacesuit’s stomach, were his middle maw has begun to take shape and reveal itself in desperation. Everything in him _screams_ to go _after her._ Satisfy the bloodlust once and for all.

 _The world would reset._ Obsidian thinks, mind blanking temporarily as he leans against the wall of the corridor and stares at Gray’s door. _If she dies. It… It resets. It resets. Right? Right? Would everything be back to normal? To this ‘normal’?_

 **KILL HER.** Mira screams at him.

He can’t. He won’t. Not her. Obsidian curses and dry heaves before he takes off in a run down the hall. He doesn’t care how loud his footsteps are or whether anyone sees. His mind gives in to the foreign desire Mira implanted in him. He finds Gold in the cafeteria, drinking a bottle with no care what is going on around him; the latter’s helmet sits on the table beside Gold.

“Cappp,” the man slurs loudly when he approaches, blond hair tussled about his pasty white skin. He extends his bottle. “Ya wun some? Takes the edge riiight outta ya… heh… Cap? Captain?”

 _“That…won’t be necessary.”_ Obsidian speaks in his own language. His central maw unfurls as he paints the cafeteria crimson.


	6. animosity EATS YOU ALIVE pt. 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this chapter includes stuff about alcohol/ism and implied previous sexual encounters. the first section also includes a slight reference to past trauma/abuse someone experienced. it is a continuation from the previous chapter and will probably have one more section added to it. :0

Soft lips press against his arm. The man smiles faintly and pulls the warm body against his chest. The tiny squeak Mint makes when he wraps arms around her is worth every second of grief the Captain might give him later. Her soft, wavy hair tickles his collarbone as the woman turns her head to look up him. Cyan huffs and rests his chin on her head, not wanting to return to the world of tasks and responsibilities quite yet.

His hand absentmindedly rubs up and down Mint’s arm. “—Good morning.”

He lets go when Mint turns over and peeks up at him. Her cheeks are bright red. Her green eyes are beautiful enough to make Cyan exhale softly.

“H—Hey,” the woman smiles. She inches closer to him and curls into his chest. “M—Morning—Cyan.”

“Sleep well?” He rustles her hair, amused by the soft squeak.

“It was,” a pause. “…better than… usual.”

“No nightmares?” Cyan raises a brow.

“No big ones,” Mint smiles again. “I—I owe it to you… for… being here…”

“I’m a good distraction,” Cyan keeps his voice level and neutral. The implications have Mint blushing again.

Her blushing is adorable, and Cyan savors every second of it. The knowledge _he_ makes her this way is a powerful motivator. Her attention fuels the desire to keep her close, as if the desire could drown him any more than it already has.

“L—Last night, Cyan,” Mint’s soft voice catches his attention. She looks like a goddess resting against him, clothed in her bedsheets and bathed in the station's artificial light. Cyan hears his heartbeat in his head as Mint shyly goes on. “—It was—Was—It was really… Nice.”

“As it should be,” Cyan mutters under breath, sighing against the sweet scent of her shampoo. Her hair reeks of the minty aroma. “…always. Always… enjoyable.”

“I, um,” Mint reaches up and plays with a strand of her hair.

The man pauses. Frowns. “Mint.”

“This… Was it… um,” the woman fumbles over her words. Cyan waits patiently while Mint figures out what she wants to say. “Was it—Did—Did you just do it—For—To—To—Get _laid?”_

Hearing Mint ask _such_ an absurd question almost provokes a fit of laughter. Cyan keeps it contained. He stares at her a second before it processes in his brain that she’s serious. The man pauses, contemplating how to word his response. He decides actions convey things better than words; he leans over and kisses her. Her lips are even better now than the previous night. When Mint squeaks, Cyan breaks apart, smiles, and peers into her eyes. “If I only wanted a fuck—I wouldn’t be here in the morning.”

“I…” Mint squeaks again. Cyan kisses her until she melts against him. He tilts her head up and sighs against her lips, satisfied. She is a breathless mess by the time he parts. The woman pants, speechless, watching as Cyan licks his lips and smirks.

“You know, I never… broke regulation before, _”_ Cyan inhales the scent of _mint_. His hands begin to rub and massage the woman’s arms again. He keeps his hands from wandering, knowing just how important it is for Mint to hear verbal reassurance. “I want to break it again. With you.”

Seeing her green eyes widen and then relax makes Cyan’s body tingle with warmth. He nuzzles her head while Mint clings to him. There is nothing sexual about the two’s naked bodies curled and entangled in one another, not at this second. There is only the intimacy both nauts desperately seek in one another.

Cyan wouldn’t mind the moment lasting forever. He hums against Mint’s hair and rubs her back soothingly. She kisses his neck and mumbles, “I… really like you. Cyan. I…”

“I know,” the man remarks matter-of-factly. He holds back a grin when Mint squeaks and grumbles into his neck. Cyan falls quiet when her lips find his skin. Mint leaves sweet, chaste kisses across his neck and down his collarbone. The man shivers and pulls her tighter. He whispers against her hair, “You’re so innocent—”

“Am I?” Mint pulls back and looks up at him, blinking slowly. Her lips tug at a bashful smile.

“Not for long,” Cyan says as he lets go and climbs on top of her. Mint falls back into her bed and watches him, a blushing, breathless mess, while Cyan slowly peels back the bedsheet. A shaky breath falls from his lips as his eyes _roam._

An obnoxious siren goes off in the room. The two nauts freeze before Cyan bites back a curse and climbs off Mint, clambering for the data pads on the floor. He tosses Mint’s to hers before fetching his own and sitting on the edge of the bed. His eyes widen as he sees the alert onscreen.

“We need to go, meeting in the cafeteria,” Cyan states, slipping back into his orderly and task-driven self already. He hears Mint mumble an _okay_ in agreement. The man helps her gather a clean thermal suit and eases her into her mint-green suit before he dresses himself. His suit is not clean, but he doesn’t care about appearances as the two exit Mint’s quarters and walk to the cafeteria.

* * *

The crewmates are silent. Even Gray is taken aback, rendered speechless by the sight before her. She can’t think of words as the Impostor watches the station Captain address the crew with a heavy sigh.

“…I thought it was best everyone see it for themselves. I’ll have the… drones clean Gold up shortly.” The Captain bows his head in respect for the deceased crewmate.

Gray feels nausea churn inside her body. She is an amorphous figure made of starstuff and light, but within the copycat body of flesh and integrated spacesuit parts, she feels her fake stomach turn and writhe uncomfortably. She doesn’t like what she sees. Even if the employees are _Mira_ , there is a cruelty and callousness in the deaths that leaves her concerned. The deaths—death, as the crewmates are not yet aware Green is deceased—are _angry_. Furious. 

Her eyes return to the station Captain. He is almost certainly Green’s murderer, but she hesitates to assign him the guilt of this death too. She doesn’t recall him having _anger issues._ She doesn’t recall him being like… this.

Strange, how quickly her mind accepts him, as if _she_ has known the Captain personally for years, and as if the two have history.

Another reason to kill him: he makes her think incessantly nonsensical thoughts. He’s a distraction to her goals at the station. He’s a figure she needs to kill to enact chaos across the crewmates.

 _But if he’s killing the crewmates…_ She feels conflicted. Technically, Obsidian is _helping_ her by killing crewmates. It’s tactically advantageous to have him around.

But he’s still a naut. He belongs to _Mira_. He needs to die like the rest of them.

A waft of something sweet with a subtle spicy note hits suit and floods through the integrated suit into olfactory receptors and reconstructed nostrils. She breathes in the scent of _longing_ , an indulgent flavor but not usually directed at her. Gray pauses, brows scrunching on her face, as she scans the crowd of crewmates. Her eyes cross paths with Obsidian’s while the latter is mid-speech about changes to security protocols and new patrol shifts, and though the woman _knows_ there is no way to confirm he looks at her or for him to notice she looks at him, Gray cannot help but feel a _shiver_ crawl up her spine.

She smells the _longing_. She breathes it in.

 _Fuck._ This makes things a lot more complicated.

* * *

Obsidian feels some remorse for his actions. He gives a great eulogy on Gold’s accomplishments and value as a crewmate while he instructs the station’s cleaning drones to activate and sanitize the cafeteria. The process takes a while, but Obsidian knows how to drag things out. He forces himself to celebrate Gold’s life, because even if Gold was _Mira_ there was no vengeance or justification in _why_ Obsidian murdered him.

He didn’t do it because of what _Mira_ has done to his species. He didn’t act because he wants to stop _Mira_. Even if he wants to stop _Mira_ —he does, Obsidian reflects, as Mira’s words repeat in his head: KILL THEM ALL KILL THEM ALL **_K I L L_** —he murdered Gold purely because of the fake damn bloodlust Mira forced into his head.

He wants it out. He wants _Mira_ out. He wants _Mira_ to leave him and Gray the fuck alone before he keels over in a flurry of torn stars, supernovae, and light years-long rips in space. He won’t get what he wants because it is a _punishment_ BUT HE WANTS IT TO LEAVE HIM ALONE.

Midway through the meeting, Obsidian explains new night patrols headed by _Cyan._ He ignores the glares he _knows_ Cyan gives him; he needs to retain the image of a Captain and that means ramping up security in the wake of a murder.

 _Two murders._ Obsidian remembers, but he announces Green being _missing_ and asks crewmembers to come to him if they see anything suspicious or have any leads.

More than once in the meetings he watches Gray. Her very presence has heat shooting through his body. He envisions her beneath him in more than one way. His head is overtaken by thoughts of her in various states. He breathes in and realizes the _longing_ radiates off him in _droves._ Obsidian cannot reduce it or hide it. His bloodlust is a force to be reckoned with, as is his actual feelings for the woman.

At one point he swears she stares at him through her helmet. He wants nothing more than to sweep her off her feet, carry her to a private room, and reconnect in body, mind, and spirit. Her blood calls to him. Her presence enraptures him. He wants her dead. He wants her. He despises the warring inside himself; never has a being made of starstuff been so conflicted. He briefly ponders throwing himself out the airlock, but he cannot fathom leaving Gray to face _Mira H.Q._ alone in this universe. Nauts are too fragile and soft. Too many enemies exist. He must protect her.

 _From myself?_ He asks when the meeting concludes, lingering in the cafeteria. He doesn’t notice the irritated footsteps until Cyan shoves him against the window and hisses in his face.

 _“What_ the fuck is wrong with you?” His second-in-command is irate; the voice grates Obsidian’s ears.

“Release me, Cyan.” Obsidian barks with the authority of a naut Captain.

Cyan lets go and steps back, but the man clearly shakes with rage. “Why? Why did you put _me_ on night patrols? You know—You _know_ —I can’t—”

“You can and you will.” Obsidian crosses his arms, tone firm.

“I _can’t,”_ Cyan repeats, hands tensing into fists. “Mint needs someone to keep her company or she has _night terrors—_ ”

“Night terrors?” The Captain pauses, uncertain how to process the words. He can’t recall a universe where the naut _Mint_ has _night terrors_.

“…Yeah.” Cyan spits out. “It’s not my place to tell you about them, but here we are. She has night terrors, _captain_ , and they’re the worst I’ve ever seen.”

The implications behind the words nauseate the Impostor.

“Why wasn’t this discussed with me?” Obsidian asks. He drops his arms to his sides.

“It _was_.” The way his second-in-command speaks annoys Obsidian. “It’s in her medical file. Which, for your information, she told me about—I didn’t go looking.”

The concern in his voice is heavy. Irritation aside, Cyan is _worried_ about the other naut, as if he genuinely cares for her wellbeing. Obsidian wonders if he does, or if the man just wants a lay. He’s never known Cyan to hold affections for another, save the previous world, but he knows there’s a first for everything.

“You sure about this? You aren’t sneaking in to _fuck her?”_ His words come out colder than he intends. Maybe not as cold as he intends. He's bitter. Jealous. So jealous. 

His second-in-command resumes seething. “I am not—”

“Don’t lie to your captain, Cyan,” Obsidian snaps. “I heard you the other night—”

“You what?” Cyan’s demeanor changes instantly. He goes from tough and concerned to frozen in panic.

Obsidian isn’t sure how the _fear_ tastes to him; it isn’t as satisfying as the flavor usually is.

“You weren’t quiet.” The Captain remarks, annoyed by the memory.

“Fuck. Fuck—Did—anyone else hear?” Cyan is suddenly _very_ nervous, and understandably so: breaking Mira H.Q. regulations leads to suspension of the naut's license and immediate termination of existing employment. 

“Does it matter?” Obsidian asks, irate. “You and her …” He chokes on the thought, disgusted again. _Bitter bitter bitter._

How dare employees of _Mira_ fuck around while his species suffers, while he is kept from Gray, while _Mira_ tears through his mind and fill him with heinous, cruel thoughts.

“If I get send home—She’ll be crushed—Sir—” Cyan grabs his arm and stares at him. “Sir—I can’t—The H.Q. can’t find out about this! They can’t—”

“You knew the consequences.” Obsidian states, brushing the man’s hand away. “ _Both_ of you knew the consequences.”

“Captain—” The naut is angry now. Angry and desperate. _“Captain Obsidian!”_

“Return to your quarters, Cyan,” Obsidian dismisses him with a stiff nod. “I have a lot on my mind after _Gold’s murder_. Your relationship woes aren’t one of them.”

Cyan pauses. Obsidian wonders how many things the man holds back. A lot of expletives, and maybe a plea or two. To his surprise, Cyan bows his head and strides away, nodding at someone standing by an exit to cafeteria. Mint waits for him, then draws him in for a quick hug. The embrace is short-lived but even as the duo walk out of sight, Obsidian feels bitterness churn in his spirit. He grits his teeth in his jaw and central maw as he thinks about how _happy_ the two nauts are.

* * *

From her location in the ventilation shaft connecting to the cafeteria, Gray seethes in her spot. She can barely constrain the anger brooding in her body when she hears how the Captain deliberately dismisses Cyan’s concerns. He is cruel and he is callous. Obsidian must go, and it is up to Gray to take care of the problem before the man murders anyone else. She quickly sneaks her way back through the vent and pops out of the generator room. The woman closes the ventilation panel and secures it with loose screws before strolling back to her quarters.

To anyone else, it looks like she went out for a walk, or on a task run. Gray doesn’t relax until she is back in her room and sitting on her bed. The thin bedsheet is unusually straight and flat where it is draped across her strange ‘mattress.’ She sighs and unclasps her helmet, then unhooks oxygen tubes and sets the helmet next to her on the edge of her bed.

She bites her lip and glances at the door. She needs to find booze, and a lot of it.

* * *

She accumulates a secret stash of basic alcoholic drinks over the weeks. Most of it comes in the form of distilled, homemade beer, an under the table concoction that Scarlet makes her _swear_ not to share with anyone. Gray promises, only out of guilt knowing Scarlet usually confides in Gold over anyone else.

She builds up her relationships with the other crewmates. It isn’t easy, but she begins to offer small trinkets and gifts to the few who don’t shut her out. Magenta is kind enough to accept her offering of friendship. From there, Gray slowly works her way to befriending _Obsidian._ The murderous bastard is unusually solemn and stern with her, often speaking in cryptic sentences or ending conversations suddenly even when she thinks it is progressing well. She doesn’t get close with him, but the two go from strange colleagues to tolerated acquaintances. It will be enough.

In the time it takes her to build a suitable supply of booze and a friendly persona, another death happens.

Mint, the shy mint-green suited crewmate who often stuck by Cyan’s side, is found butchered in her quarters. The rest of the crewmates are alerted to the discovery when Cyan breaks down screaming and weeping before falling quiet in shock. None of the flavors appeal to her. _Horror_ does not fit the tastes on her tongue when she soaks in the emotions Cyan’s nigh-catatonic state exhibits. Even after the station nurse coaxes the man to the medical bay, there is no purging the foul flavors from the air. Gray herself reeks of _shock_ when she peeks into the quarters and sees the mess left behind.

Though the other crewmates miss it, she spots the telltale signs of a ventilation shaft in use: loose screws, and the smear of blood on the outside panel.

The killer, _Captain Obsidian,_ is an Impostor.

She decides then and there she isn’t going to play nice. She won’t bring him booze or flutter eyelashes. Her entire form shakes with rage as she stands outside in the corridor. _I’m going to tear him limb-from-limb and extinguish every star in his eyes._

* * *

It is _night_ when she strikes.

She enters the way he must have when the man murdered Mint: through the ventilation shafts, space suit discarded to allow for an amorphous transformation that fits through the narrow tunnels. The woman slips into the captain’s room while he is busy in the bathroom. When she hears the shower running, she exits the vent and leaves the panel open and bare for quick escape. Gray’s eyes narrow as she takes on a more humanoid figure once again. She forces her body to hide its lights, but her silvery hair lingers and the lights of her eyes gleam softly with an untold expanse inside them.

She doesn’t know how it will end. She feels _powerful,_ an alien species with raw energy coursing through her form, but she knows other Impostors are the same. They are all stars at a distance. She cannot discern the depth of strength the Captain has until the two fight. The possibility exists he will overpower her and kill her, but she must take the risk. She wants him _dead,_ smothered out and smeared underfoot like the nauts he brutally picked apart. Nothing else will do.

She waits a time, counting seconds in her head to stay focused. She has the captain’s bedroom memorized like the stars in her sky by the time the shower turns off. Irritated grumbling comes from the bathroom. The door opens, light floods the bedroom, and from her hiding place tucked behind a large armoire, Gray sees him: the Captain.

He is everything and nothing like she expects. Strong, muscular, with cosmos in his black skin and stars in his eyes. He is beautiful in every way, with muscle definition in places that makes Gray’s resolve falter and a jaw that has her spirit conflicted. He is every bit an Impostor. He is like _her,_ only _not_ , and he is breathtaking in the most wonderful, mortifying way. Gray’s head spins as she watches the man walk to his bed in nothing but a towel around his waist. She keeps her eyes up and her mind focused even as the Captain stops in front of the armoire.

“I won’t!” he _seethes,_ and for a second Gray questions if the man has found her. But Obsidian doesn’t notice her; he wrenches his armoire open and grabs a thermal suit. The skintight material is thrown on his bed.

His towel drops and Gray knows she should look away. For the sake of _openings_ and an ambush attack, she makes herself stare. Her pulse races as she roams the man’s body with her eyes. He is _so perfect,_ so cruel but inviting, that for a moment she considers it. She briefly ogles him before her personal morals kick in and she mentally chides herself for peeping like a child at a group bath.

“Need to find Cyan. Cyan next.” Obsidian utters under breath. He finishes stepping into the thermal suit, skintight and form-fitting, before he walks to his bed and climbs in. The thin bedsheet is his only protection, and it will not be enough to stop _her_.

She needs to stop him. She doesn’t have a choice; he is going to kill again. He’ll take _her_ kills.

“Not her.” Obsidian repeats to himself. “Shut up. Not her. No. I’ll keep her safe.”

* * *

She knows Impostors need _very_ little sleep. When she hears the Captain dozing off in his bed, she crawls out from behind the armoire and silently rises to full height. Her eyes reflect anger and pain as she approaches the bedside. Her arm stretches and morphs into a blurred cloud of space. She sucks in a soft breath and lifts her arm.

The captain’s datapad goes off. Gray freezes in place as Obsidian’s twinkling eyes shoot open and land on her. He sits up immediately and grabs her wrist when she tries to bring space down on him. But something is wrong; the man is _shocked_ to see her there. Gray twists out of his grasp just in time for him to body check her into the floor. The Impostor hisses and bashes her head against the man’s chest. He’s too large, far taller than _her,_ and to her shock his gravitational pull and starstuff is on equal grounds with her own.

She isn’t a unique star.

“Gray— _Gray!”_ The Captain yells at her while she thrashes against him, eventually bringing her knees up and _kicking_ him off her body.

“Fuck off,” the Impostor shouts at him. “Fuck off, _captain!”_

“This can’t be right—It _can’t_ be right—Not _you_ —" He sounds shocked.

Good.

* * *

His entire world comes crashing down in a second. Obsidian cannot move or tear his eyes from the enraged woman in front of him. He lifts his fists up instinctively when she comes barreling down upon him; the first strike hits his chest before Gray smashes her leg into his gut in a sudden roundhouse kick. Obsidian’s mind goes into autopilot; he blocks her jabs and deflects another kick, grunting in pain. The bloodlust begins to stir in his body, but he reins it in and forces himself to remain passive, defending and blocking only as needed as Gray beats him.

She is as brutal as she is stubborn. The occasions where she is the Impostor have been bloody ones. Obsidian recounts the bodies found across the worlds when Gray’s been involved; most end up in a fashion similar to _Gold_ , albeit not as messy. She is a fierce opponent; in the past he loved that about her.

Here, it takes every ounce of willpower not to pin her to the ground and let instinct take over; Obsidian wants to rip her throat out and spill blood. He feels Mira coax him on, the sweet symphonies of outside influence blaring in his ears as he tussles with Gray around his private quarters. Anything loose is knocked to the side or broken, sometimes thrown, as he spars the woman and continues his approach of _defense defense defense._

“Why won’t you stay fucking down?!” Gray snarls at him at one point, her form panting and heavy as she pushes his arms to the floor and straddles him.

Obsidian hisses in response. He feels his body wearing down; the blast of radiation in his face from a pissed off cosmological entity will kill him a week out. Already he envisions his DNA dying, the radiation mutating his body until no cells are reproduced for his flesh. Even an Impostor can die; Obsidian shudders where Gray has him pinned. His outlook for the future is bleak, but he can’t let himself die, not yet, not _now_.

“Stay _down!_ ” Gray snaps again, her hair falling and obscuring her face while she stares the man down. “You’re going to pay for what you did to Green and Gold, _Impostor!”_

“Speak for yourself,” Obsidian grits his jaws. He feels his inner maw begin to unfurl, but he takes a deep breath and sucks it back into his body. His naut-like flesh melds together at his abdomen. _“Get off me!”_

“Fuck you!”

Obsidian grimaces at the common insult. He tenses as Gray squeezes his wrists and leans down until she’s but a few inches away. When it dawns on him how close she is, his mind begins _racing_ with thoughts of a brewing bloodlust and everything between. He parts his lips and exhales softly while Gray watches him like a pissed off hawk.

“—I don’t know who you _really_ are, _Captain,_ ” the Impostor whispers as her own central maw unfurls. The sight is harrowing: a great, inky-black tendril of a tongue slips out and oozes spit unto his clothed navel while the sheen of bleached white teeth poke out where Gray’s thermal suit is now torn over her abdomen. “—But this station is _mine_ to take down. These crewmates are _mine_ to kill. _Mine_ to torment. You have fuckin’ nerve—”

“Gray,” Obsidian tries again, clenching his eyes shut when he hears Mira in his head screaming to rip the woman apart. The captain begins to writhe against her iron-clad grip. “Listen—Listen to me—This is—”

“No. I’m not here to listen.” Her voice is cold and callous. “I despise _Mira_ more than anyone else—But you’re high on the list. I’m not a merciful Impostor, captain. Neither are you.”

The bloodlust in Obsidian roars in confirmation. His breathing hitches and his heart pounds _wildly_ in his head when Gray shifts how she sits atop him. He knows she’ll try and kill him if he doesn’t do _something_. He needs to do _something,_ anything! He needs to keep the world around a little longer; he’s never experienced a time when the two aren’t against the other. Obsidian forces his body to relax; he stares up at Gray while she eyes him with hate in her eyes.

Eyes he loves, for the stars in her irises and the lights of the universe tucked in the depths.

Eyes he despises, for he needs to gouge them out with a spoon and squash them underfoot.

Eyes he is lost in, hopeless as ever, utterly infatuated and desperate to kill and caress the woman on top of him.

He realizes, with no hope in his heart, she is—

“Still beautiful.” Obsidian chokes on the words. “Still…”

**_KILL HER._ **

He doesn’t know when his les transform into amorphous tendrils but the void-like appendages wrap around the Impostor and rip her off him. Gray is out of his grasp in a second, bringing a new barrage of fists and teeth and _everything_ with her wrath as the two dance about the room. Obsidian’s mind wars with itself as he begins to lash back in response. He finds himself sinking into a desperation over his unwanted needs. He starts to fight harder, a portion of him wanting to bring the woman to heel by his own hand.

He gets a chance when she’s knocking his armoire over and lunging across the top. Obsidian sidesteps and slams a hand unto Gray’s hair while she staggers past him. He _yanks_ her back and pulls her into a spin; her back hits his chest and the two _breathe._

* * *

Two mingling scents. A mixture of feelings. Conflictions.

The two Impostors freeze.

* * *

A low rumble comes from the captain’s body. It is alien in nature, perfectly befitting an Impostor, but when she hears it a very different reaction occurs. Gray shivers in his grasp and leans into his chest. Curses and expletives hang on her lips as she tries to turn around. The woman decides to throw her head into his chest and collarbone when she fails to wiggle her way free. She growls when Obsidian tells her to _knock it off_.

“Well,” Gray spits at the ground, bitterly furious, while Obsidian’s arms keep her own pinned to her side. She decides to stall for time. “What the fuck happens now?”

* * *

_Stop… Just stop, Gray!_ Obsidian repeats in his head. He closes his eyes a moment and sees _KILL HER KILL HER KILL KILL **KILL**_ written in red on his inner eyelids.

“I won’t,” Obsidian hisses at himself. “I won’t fucking touch her!”

* * *

His words baffle Gray. She’s taken aback long enough for Obsidian to ensnare her in his grasp and tuck her under his arm like she’s little more than an accessory. He carries her across the threshold marking the end of the living quarters and start of the private bathroom.

Gray’s rage returns, but in the stupor of confusion at _his_ babbles and her own ire, Gray doesn’t realize what’s happening until she is unceremoniously tossed into the shower on her butt. She hits her head on the ceramic walls and howls with pain, clutching a bleeding patch on her head just before she hears water turn on.

The woman snaps her head up. Her eyes widen in shock when she sees the station caption change the water temperature to _cold_. She gasps at the sudden shift when the spray of cold water hits them both and chills her to the bone. Her thermal suit is useless when wet. She wraps her arms around herself, no longer interested in fighting. She doesn’t hide her disgusted scowl or strings of expletives. She glares at the station captain nearby, who is further back at the other end of the shower sitting on a bench. The cold-water fans out and hits his body from the chest down, causing his thermal suit to stick to his skin.

“What’s wrong wi—With you?” Gray chatters, her central maw no longer interested in unfurling and exposing itself to the cold. She remains in the form of a naut while the cold shower water hits her.

“It’s,” Obsidian’s teeth grind together. He wraps his arms around himself. “The—The only way—I can—Think—”

 _“W—What?”_ The woman blurts in response.

 _“Mira,”_ it is the name of the company which captures Gray’s attention, spoken so _foully_ she shivers. Obsidian hisses. “M—Mira—Did—It’s done—T—Things—Things _to me!”_

By the stars, it’s _fucking cold._

Gray clutches herself and shivers. Her twinkling eyes reek of disbelief and confusion, the anger less prevalent. _“W—What things?”_

“B—B—” For a moment Obsidian’s jaws chatter violently, betraying how the cold affects him.

Gray is not usually this patient, but she waits for the man to go on.

“Blood—L—Lust,” Obsidian breathes out, sputtering and choking on the cold water. “They—They made me—Made me—B—Bloodlust—”

He lifts a finger and points at her. Gray balks at the insinuation. “You—You—”

“F—For you,” Obsidian hisses the last bit out.

 ** _“What?”_** Words come out in a waterfall of confusion, each as cold and frigid as the water blasting her in the damn shower. Gray cannot take the cold anymore. She rears up, her body augmenting itself as it phases between a solid flesh form and the amorphous stardust of an Impostor, and her right arm rips forward. Obsidian hisses but he can’t stop the tendril from _smashing_ the shower knob off. Gray lets her body revert to a naut’s form; she stands, wraps arms around herself, and snarls at the captain. “I—I am— _Freezing—_ Fuck’s sake—I’m not—Not—Having this discussion—Here— _Here—!”_

Obsidian utters a curse but doesn’t stop her from leaving the shower. She stands, dripping wet, looking around for anything to dry herself off with, before the woman gives up and spins on her heels. Her twinkling eyes narrow on the station captain. “You—You _start explaining_ —I—I need—Change of—Clothes—”

 _“—You—You’re an Impostor,”_ Obsidian points out, teeth continuing to chatter across multiple jaws.

“I don’t enjoy b—Being _cold_ ,” Gray retorts. _“You want to talk?_ Get me a—dry fucking suit!”

In the end, the captain buckles under her pressure and unlocks an armoire next to his bed for her to pick out one of his thermal suits. Obsidian instinctively turns away from Gray when she finds one that looks suitable for her shorter figure. The woman snorts before she doubles back to the bathroom. _As if I would change in front of him._

It _shouldn’t_ matter, because Impostors do not reproduce like nauts, but there is something _odd_ about the station captain; he makes Gray aware of these things. She finds herself reflecting on her interactions with the man. Most of her emotions taste spicy or foul, like a burnt undertone to the rage she feels when considering the brutality of his murders. The spiciness of other emotions lingers on her tongue. She envisions the passion of hate. She breathes in the savory nature of wrath. Sometimes the feelings border on intoxicating in intensity. Other times her emotions make no sense.

Hopefully, talking to the man can get her some answers. She intends to gouge answers out of him one way or another, though his cooperation makes things less messy. 

When she integrates the new thermal suit into her figure, it appears as a deep gray, almost black skintight suit. The material feels like an extension of her body. She turns around and looks at herself in the mirror a moment before fumbling with the zipper on the back. In pulling it up, it catches on itself near her nape. Gray hisses and gives up. She exits the bathroom and finds Obsidian pacing wildly in circles. The man is soaked to the bone and his maws chatter endlessly. He snaps his head up at her entrance and she holds up a hand in greeting. “I still want to kill you, so—You better make this good.”

Obsidian pauses. The captain’s dazzling eyes drop down Gray’s figure before flitting back to her face. He spaces out for a moment, face deeply flushed and upper mouth ajar. Gray raises an eyebrow. “What?”

 _“Fuck Mira,”_ the captain mumbles quickly, running a hand over his head. He resumes his pacing. “This entire—Mess—Right—Answers…”

* * *

Mira is cruel. Heinous. Vindictive. Vengeful. Disgusting. So many adjectives for the hideous, horrible company. The company has no heart, no soul, no spirit, no mind, nothing and no one and zero and _zilch_ going for it. It nauseates him to consider how empty the white suits are, with their dinky chrome-covered helmets and their torturous methods. They are too afraid to face him or Gray alone, so both get thrown into the wonderland and spun on the carousal like lives are endless and memories of non-importance.

_If I could find you outside this loaded gun, if I could wake you up again…_ It tugs at his heartstrings, at all the ones that exist and then the ones that don’t.

Obsidian grits his teeth. Mira H.Q. is toxic to its core, using Gray against him, pitting the two in head-to-head battles of wits and will and _lives_. He hates the complexity of it all. He hates betraying Gray when he is the Impostor. He hates making her suffer. He hates everything about the two’s predicament.

He hates the bloodlust.

It does something to him, it makes him feel things beyond the norms for Impostors. It _torments_ him in many ways, in ways he doesn’t _usually_ ponder, in means he doesn’t _intend_ to think of. It fills him with a raging inferno. It busies him with an overwhelming wave of _want_ , buried beneath violent tendencies ad frothy desires. The lines between pleasure and pain blur until they are an incandescent whole he must throw his focus into in order to navigate. When he is alone on the station, he can maintain most control of himself, burying his own callous needs beneath a firm demeanor.

He doesn’t _want_ to hurt anyone. He doesn’t want to hurt Grey.

 _Mira_ isn’t him. Mira wants him to suffer. Mira wants _her_ to suffer. He isn’t sure why—something about eliciting a certain reaction from Gray, something about using her reactions to _create_ —but the details don’t matter. Mira wants the two to suffer and he wants to eject himself from the airlock because of the thoughts injected into his mind.

He seriously contemplates it. He considers it especially now, as the heat licks his body and with it spreads across his form. He is an Impostor, but he cannot hide the cracks and crevices within himself. The feelings pour over him and he stands, shaking, trying to think of more words while his mind spirals and swarms and the world overwhelms him.

Obsidian loves her. He loves her and he loves _her_ and he wants her joy and happiness and peace more than anything else in the universe. Mira could take him forever and he would die happy knowing it kept him safe IF IT ONLY KEPT HER SAFE HE WANTS TO KEEP HER SAFE HE NEEDS TO KEEP HER SAFE **KEEP HER SAFE**

He is an entity of ancient beings and star stuff mixed like an industrial blender beating batter and dough into shape. He loves her. He LOVES. He struggles. He loves. He loves. He lusts. His desires are not wholly corrupt in nature, as they reflect the little pieces he cannot process easily. Impostors do not _lust_ like nauts lust.

**PRIMORDIAL DEITIES OF THE F A R AND VOID DO NOT LUST A F T E R THE L I G H T.**

By the cosmic depths and swirling celestial bodies, by every star put into the sky and every flickering, dying supernovae, he is nothing more than matter stretched too thin; he is the void and the void is absent and meaningless without a light to fill it. He loves her, he loves her, he loves her, and he wants her to know the extent of every declaration that has yet to fall from his lips. Mind, body, soul, _spirit_ , he loves her. His lust is real and rife with the same insecurities he possesses knowing an Impostor BEING OF THE VOID should not cross with another Impostor BEING OF THE LIGHT.

They are two groups, neither homogenous nor heterogenous, individual and pure UNTIL HE FUCKED IT UP **THIS IS HIS FAULT**. 

Mira took his emotions and raked it until he bled galaxies and black holes.

He cannot stop the unnatural plume of rising bloodthirst in his veins. He looks at Gray mid-sentence, stopping in his spiel to mumble something about answers, and he looks at her. He really, truly looks at her.

 _Impostors can die._ MIRA TELLS HIM.

 _Take what you want._ MIRA SCREAMS.

 _Kill her and be done with it._ MIRA PLEADS.

 _You belong to us, captain._ HE KNOWS.

He trembles and steps backward. Obsidian’s eyes are wide, pupils blown and dilated. He cannot stop shaking as he falls unto his be and sits on the edge, at a loss of everything. He cannot fathom himself. He cannot fathom hurting her again. He can’t. He can’t.

He’s trying so hard to keep himself together, but he doesn’t notice when he starts to sob. Freezing cold tears, like a comet shooting across space, fall in clumps down his beautiful skin.

By Mira, he’s cold. He’s so cold. He’s tired. Mira is breaking him down and he doesn’t know how much longer he can withstand it’s onslaught on his mind. His thoughts surge with the need to spill blood. He dreams of it in his hands, in his blurry vision and foggy mind. He looks at his palms and sees flashing shapes and colors.

“Help me,” he begs her, not aware she already is. “I—I—I’ll kill again. I’m going to kill again.”

“Fuck no, you aren’t,” Gray’s voice is stubborn and firm and soothing and enraging. Obsidian’s body tenses as he feels her hand touch his shoulder. The hand retracts and Gray curses under her breath before she stops near where his hunched over form sits on the bed. “You—You murdered them. I know you did. You murdered Green—”

“Yes.” Obsidian confesses in a whisper.

“—and Gold—”

“He offered me a bottle.” The man recants.

“—And _Mint,_ ” and that is the moment Obsidian’s blood runs colder than it already is. Every ounce of Impostor inside him, every swirling ball of energy burning away in his core, it all **stops.** He freezes. Gray goes on, not noticing, “What? Got nothing to say about _her?_ That’s fucked up—"

“I didn’t,” Obsidian mumbles weakly, turning to grab Gray’s hands and stare beyond his blurry vision. “I—No—No—No—”

* * *

The mess of a captain in front of her begins to babble and proclaim innocence. Gray stares, perplexed and confused, uncertain this is even the same man she saw coldly brush Cyan aside prior to Mint's murder. Before her eyes, the captain goes off on a tangent about the killer not being him. She doesn’t know what to make of it until the Impostor, still soaked to the stars, squeezes her hands, draws Gray close, and whispers, _“—_ There’s a—Another Impostor among us.”


End file.
